A Scaly Situation
by Awesomalicious
Summary: *THIS STORY TAKES PLACE SHORTLY AFTER HTTYD 2* After being bit by a mysterious dragon on a newly discovered island, Hiccup slowly realizes he's turning into a Night Fury. And that's not his only problem when a past enemy of Berk decides to take revenge against the Dragon Master and his Alpha Night Fury. Hiccup will need the help of his friends and a stranger from a foreign land.
1. Ch1 The Shimmer in the Mist

_Chapter 1_

_**The Shimmer in the Mist**_

They flew over to the foreign land they had just discovered. Toothless searched for a good place to land, but found it difficult to see through the dense mist. Hiccup looked down from his majestic Night Fury. He was afraid he'd have to leave and explore this mysterious island another time with this arduous task to navigate through the fog.

Toothless sighed. He moaned at Hiccup, trying to convince him to start turning back to Berk. Hiccup disagreed.

"Just a little longer. Who knows? Maybe this fog will lighten up while we're still here."

Toothless rolled his eyes, but obeyed his rider and continued his flight.

Ten more minutes passed, and Toothless was growing impatient. Toothless decided to go against Hiccup and turned around in the opposite direction towards Berk.

"What are you doing, bud? We still have plenty of time before we need to get back."

Toothless ignored him and kept flying. Hiccup was becoming a little annoyed at his dragon.

"Come on, Toothless. Who knows when we'll be able to visit again? You know I don't have much time to do these things anymore."

Ever since Hiccup's father passed away and he took on his duties as Chief, he had been too occupied with the wellbeing of his people and less time exploring. Lucky for him, Astrid, who was now Hiccup's wife, could see the desperate look in Hiccup's eyes that he wanted to get back out and explore and was kind enough to give him the morning off while she took over during his absence. Hiccup didn't want to spend his morning away without a decent search of the island's surface.

"And who knows what's on that island? There could be dragons waiting to be discovered. Maybe even a Night Fury."

Hiccup's train of thought was soon interrupted when he noticed something shimmer deep in the mist. He had no idea what it was, but he wasn't going to leave until it was found.

"Toothless, I saw something! Over there!" Hiccup pointed to where he had last seen the mysterious glimmer.

Toothless didn't believe him. He thought it was just an excuse to continue the search. He immediately changed his mind when he also saw the shimmer in the fog. Carefully, Toothless hovered closer to where the dim light previously was. To his surprise, he had managed to land safely onto level ground while searching for the object.

Hopping off Toothless, Hiccup switched his prosthetic to his "walking mode" before turning to his dragon."Alright. I think we'll have better chances find the source by splitting up. I'll go this way. You can go that way."

Toothless wanted to object, but Hiccup had already left. Toothless decided to go on his way.

Fortunately, the fog had begun to lighten up, making it better to see where you were going. With no luck, Toothless turned around to see if Hiccup had found anything. Toothless started to feel uncomfortable as he wandered on. It felt as if someone, or perhaps something, was watching him. Tooth turned in circles to see who was there, but only managed to get dizzy. Now the Night Fury had no idea where his rider was. Because of the fog still surrounding him, he wasn't able to see the pupiless eyes staring at him this whole time.

Hiccup, however, was enjoying himself. It felt good to get away from the responsibilities waiting back at Berk. He felt free from the growing stress that was being lifted off his shoulders as he continued he search.

Hiccup was surprised that the shimmering object still hasn't showed up. He wondered if it was just his imagination, but remembered Toothless had also seen it. He wondered if this fog had played a game on their minds, but dropped that thought when he saw something shining in front of him. He started to go towards this light, delighted that he had found the shimmering object, but when he was nearly a foot away, the shimmer had disappeared once again.

"_This fog must be playing games with me." _thought Hiccup. _"I guess I should get Toothless and go."_

Hiccup then turned back to where they had landed, hoping he would run into Toothless momentarily. He just hoped he was walking in the right direction.

Hiccup was disappointed that his search was a waste. He would have to go home with nothing new to tell his wife or people. He didn't even see a dragon roaming about.

Because of the fog that still covered the ground, Hiccup didn't see the rock in front his foot and tripped, falling hard on the ground, almost bending his prosthetic leg. Hiccup was knocked out instantly when his head came into contact with another nearby rock.

Meanwhile, Toothless began to sniff the ground, hoping he would be able to track down Hiccup, or at least catch the scent of his own tracks so he could follow his own path back to their starting point. Not only was Toothless on edge with the feeling something was stalking him, he was getting bored. It felt like he had been on that island for eternity, and hasn't even caught a scent of a foreign dragon, but like he would be able to smell anything with the fresh scent of the water molecules gripping the air.

Toothless kept on searching, nevertheless. He decided to walk straight forward in whatever path he chose and hoped for the best. Toothless tried to entertain himself by seeing what shapes he could make out of the fog like he and Hiccup sometimes did when flying under or above the clouds. And with the itch of someone watching him gone, Toothless was now feeling at ease.

Lying on the ground, Hiccup blinked his eyes open, looking at nothing but fog and rocks. Moaning, Hiccup put his hand to his forehead, soon regretting when it had only worsened his pain. He removed his hand from his head immediately. Looking at his palm he watched as his blood dripped onto the stone that he had hit his head on and stain its surface.

"Stupid rock." He mumbled.

Hiccup sat up and leaned against a nearby boulder and stayed down until his dizziness was gone. When his vision had cleared up, he could see it. He could see the shimmering light right in front of him, only, instead of a gem, it looked like a pair of eyes. Pupiless eyes. They looked as if they were floating in midair. Only did he realize the eyes belonged to the cloud of fog that had dispersed from the surrounding mist and was coming closer to him. The mysterious mist began to shift into an apparition of a dragon. A Night Fury, to be exact. Hiccup didn't know where this was going, but he knew it wasn't good.

"Uh, Toothless, I think we should be heading back right now!" Hiccup shouted, hoping his friend would hear him.

The mist took a step closer, now baring its teeth at Hiccup. Its teeth looked as sharp as the tip of a brand new sword. Hiccup was beginning to panic.

"I really think we should be going, Toothless!" he said in a louder voice.

Hiccup slowly stood back up, getting ready to run for it. The misty dragon sensed he would try to flee and charged at Hiccup, knocking him to the ground and sank its razor sharp teeth into his arm.

"AAAAAAAAAAHHH! TOOTHLESS!" he yelled out in pain.

Hiccup kicked about, trying to pull his arm away from the monster. His efforts to get away failed as the Night Fury bit harder, making the pain unbearable. Hiccup quickly took out his sword and lit it on fire, swinging it as the beast as hard as he could. Unfortunately, the sword did no damage and went straight through the torso, not causing any pain to the dragon. The sword was extinguished by the dragon's damp form.

_"My sword will go through this dragon, but its teeth can't go through me!" _thought Hiccup, dropping his useless sword on the ground.

In excruciating pain, Hiccup thought this was his fate. He believed he was going to die by this creature if he didn't die from blood lost first. He wasn't even sure if his own dragon had heard him shouting for him.

But Toothless had heard Hiccup. He had heard him the first time he called, only he didn't know he was in serious trouble at the time. Now, Toothless was running at lightning speed to find his friend, before it was too late. Although the fog was still too thick to see him far away, Toothless could still hear Hiccup's cries, making the dragon more desperate to find his friend. As the cries for help became louder, he knew he was in the right direction. Toothless soon found Hiccup lying on the ground with the dragon from the mist mercilessly biting his friend. The enraged Night Fury ran straight at the transparent dragon, claws extended out. The mist saw Toothless coming towards him and quickly blended back into what was left of the surrounding fog. Toothless ran to Hiccup's side and fired at the dragon, but the dragon was gone.

Toothless turned his attention back to his wounded friend, hoping he wasn't seriously injured. Blood ran down Hiccup's arm, creating a red puddle underneath it. Hiccup saw the beast had left a tooth in his arm, but was in too much pain to care.

Hiccup looked up at his best friend, "Help me up, Toothless. We need to get back to Berk."

The Night Fury helped Hiccup onto his back and grabbed his sword before lifting off. The fog was now thin enough for Toothless to see clearly and safely travel back to Berk.

Back on the mysterious island, the misty Night Fury emerged from the fog, watching them leave with a sinister smile. A new tooth had already taken place of the one he had lost to the human. The dragon ran his tongue across his upper row of teeth, licking off the same substance he had just secreted into the boy that was now flowing through his system.


	2. Ch2 A Wounded Chief

**A.N- Thanks everyone for a wonderful first week! Thank you all who reviewed, faved, and followed this story! I was happy to hear people's reactions to the first chapter, so I hope you enjoy the second one and the rest afterward. My plan is to update this story every Saturday, so you guys' ll have to wait another week for the next chapter. Enjoy chapter 2 and STAY AWESOME!**

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_**Chapter 2**_

_**A Wounded Chief**_

Although it was painful, Hiccup still did his best to steer Toothless in the right direction. Not like he had much choice. If Toothless didn't have him to help, they'd both crash into the mass of water below them. Lucky for them if that happens, there were plenty of Thunderdrums swimming below that would be able to rescue them if that happened. They were both also relieved when they were almost home.

Meanwhile, the village watched as the 6 dragon riders, Snotlout, Fishlegs, Ruffnut, Tuffnut, Astrid and their newest member, Eret, participated in the most popular game of Berk, Dragon Racing. The competitors flew around, trying to capture as many sheep as they could get their hands (or claws) on. Astrid and the twins were tied with 8 sheep, Snotlout next with 6 sheep, Fishlegs in 4th place with 3 sheep, and Eret with 1 and only sheep he has ever gotten playing this game before. Gobber carried a black sheep over to the "sheep launcher" as he called it and placed it into the cup of the catapult. The participants got ready when the sound of the horn echoed through the village.

"Enjoy your ride!" Gobber yelled as he pulled the lever, launching the fear stricken sheep into the air.

"The black sheep!" Astrid shouted as she saw the black ball of wool flying up into the sky. "Stormfly, fetch!"

The blue and yellow Deadly Nadder did as her rider had wished and flew at lightning speed, catching the black sheep a split second before it hit the ground.

"Good girl, Stormfly." Astrid praised her dragon.

Fishlegs and his Gronkle, Meatlug, had seen the black sheep as well, but were not fast enough to capture it before Astrid and Stormfly. However, Fishlegs did not notice Astrid already had the sheep and continued flying to where it would have fallen.

"Don't worry, Meatlug. I'm sure nobody else got the sheep."

Soon, Astrid and Stormfly took a sharp turn around one of the tall buildings, now on a collision course with Fishlegs and Meatlug.

Astrid gasped. "FISHLEGS!"

Astrid dodged her opponent while Fishlegs covered his eyes, waiting for them to crash. Unfortunately, Stormfly had dropped the black sheep trying to avoid collision with the Gronkle.

As the sheep plummeted towards the ground below, Meatlug stretched his front legs as far as he could and caught the sheep. With the black sheep in his possession, Meatlug flew it over to their basket before anyone tried to steal it and successfully dropped it in with the three white sheep underneath. Fishlegs, with his eyes still covered, didn't realize the roaring crowd was cheering for his win.

Gobber quickly got back up on the platform an announced, "Fishlegs is the winner!"

Fishlegs uncovered his eyes in total shock, but when he looked below him, the black sheep was indeed in his basket.

"I won? I WON!" Fishlegs put his arms in the air with happiness and pride.

"WHAT!" shouted the twins on their Zippleback.

"We'll get 'em next time, Skullcrusher." Eret said to his dragon after losing once again.

Fishlegs and his prized dragon took one last victory lap, high fiving Snotlout and other fellow Vikings as he did so.

Once a certain Night Fury was in eye sight, all attention fell away from Fishleg's victory.

"Hey, it's Hiccup!" a female Viking had shouted, causing everyone in the audience to gaze in his direction.

"Welcome back, Hiccup!"

"Good to see ya, Chief!"

Toothless landed gently onto a grassy area nearby, being greeted by his wife.

"Hey, Babe!" Astrid shouted, running to her husband. "How was your morning?" No response. "Did you find any new islands?" Hiccup continued his silence.

Astrid didn't notice the heavy breathing coming from her mate.

"You didn't need to worry about the village at all. It was a really slow morning. I didn't even need to ask Gobber for help like you suggested."

Not until Hiccup painfully got off of Toothless did she realize that he was injured.

Astrid gasped. "Hiccup!"

Concerned, the rest of Hiccup's friends, except for Fishlegs, gathered around their wounded Chief.

"Yeah! I won!" shouted Fishlegs, finishing off his victory lap.

Fishlegs' smile vanished when he saw Hiccup not too far away, blood oozing from his arm.

"Oh, no!" Fishlegs and Meatlug quickly flew over to the weak Viking.

Because of the blood lost he had suffered, Hiccup was now feeling quite faint, falling over into Astrid's arms when trying to walk.

"Hiccup, are you okay?" his concerned wife asked. Hiccup was too weak to answer. He soon fell unconscious. "GOBBER!"

The peg-legged blacksmith came as fast as he could. "What is it, Astrid?"

"It's Hiccup! He's hurt!"

Gobber examined Hiccup's bloody arm. "Is there anything you can do?" Astrid asked.

"He's lost a lot of blood, but if we get him back to my workshop quickly, I'm sure I can bandage that arm and, after a couple hours of rest, he'll be back on his feet, well, foot, in a jiffy!"

"Then what are we waiting for?!"

Astrid, with the help of Toothless, managed to get Hiccup onto Stormfly's back and flew him to Gobber's workshop immediately. Astrid flew along with Hiccup while Gobber left with Toothless instead of his own lazy dragon. Once they landed, Gobber took Hiccup into the workshop and placed him comfortably on an empty table.

Gobber turned to the other young Vikings that had also arrived. "Put pressure on those wounds! It'll stop the bleeding, or at least slow it down."

Immediately, the Vikings did as Gobber commanded and pressed as hard as they could on Hiccup's arm. The unconscious dragon rider flinched from the pain that was inflicted upon him, but other than that remained still.

Gobber made a racket searching through his workshop for something, but none of them knew exactly what he was in desperate search of. He pulled something out from an old, dusty box hiding in a dark corner. It was a roll of fabric and a jar with some type of gel contained inside. He brought them over to Hiccup and dismissed his friends from the job he had assigned them.

"What is that stuff?" asked Tuffnut.

"This stuff is something I've been working on to help injured Vikings when we still had dragon raids. Of course when the war ended between us and dragons, I didn't have any reason to use it, but kept it just in case. Good thing I did."

"What do you call it?" asked Snotlout.

"I call this," Gobber said, holding up the jar of goo, "Healing Cream."

"It looks more jelly than creamy." Ruffnut blatantly said.

"Fine! Healing GEL then!"

"HEY! Can we talk about this later!" shouted the irritated Astrid. "How about we, I don't know, SAVE HICCUP!"

Astrid's yelling returned Gobber to his important task. Using his bare hand, Gobber scooped out a small amount of the gel and began rubbing it over Hiccup's wounds.

"Ouch!" Gobber yelled out.

Gobber's fingertips bled from newly formed cuts he managed to get from a small, sharp object sticking out of Hiccup's arm. Gobber found what it was and pulled it out for the others to see, making Fishlegs to gag at the sight, who always felt queasy in these situations. Gobber was slightly shocked at what he had just discovered. He held in his had what looked to be an extremely sharp dragon tooth, the same one that had come from the mysterious dragon of the mist.

"Oh my!" Gobber examined the incisor, pondering on what foul creature had done this to his late friend's only son.

"What are you thinking, Gobber?"

"I'm thinking Hiccup may be lucky to be alive." Gobber paused. "What was I doing, again?"

"Uh, healing Hiccup."

"Oh, right."

Gobber put the tooth down and started smearing more gel where he had left off, scooping out more when it was necessary. Once all of Hiccup's bites where covered in layers of ooze, Gobber carefully wrapped his arm in the thick fabric and tied it up, keeping it from unraveling off the injured arm.

"He may be out a couple hours, but he'll be fine."

"What about the blood loss?" Astrid asked, concerned about her husband's well being.

"Although he lost a lot of blood, he didn't lose enough that it would kill him. Trust me. He's going to be fine." Gobber reassured.

Toothless made his way toward his best friend, hoping he would be ok. Toothless nudged Hiccup's uninjured arm, hoping he would wake up, but the brunette laid still.

"Gobber said he'd be out a couple hours." Astrid told the Night Fury. "But, don't worry. He'll be up and about in no time."

Everybody soon left on their dragons, going home since they had nothing else to do. The only ones to stay back were Astrid and the two dragons, Toothless and Stormfly, who waited for Hiccup to regain consciousness so they could take him home. Gobber had closed the shop which he would open when Hiccup was awake.

Astrid began to worry when a second hour had past, expecting that he would have awakened by now. Toothless, of course, was worried the entire time. This suspense soon ended, when a low moan was heard from the body on the table. The three gathered around as the boy began to open his eyes.

"Ugh. What happened?" Hiccup's vision began to come clear. "And where am I?"

"You're in Gobber's workshop. When you came back, it looked like you were bitten by a dragon. Do you remember anything?"

"I remember all of it. I remember this dragon, well, I'm not sure it really was a…" Hiccup sniffed the air, and then he sniffed his arm. "Blech! What's that smell?"

"Oh. Gobber put some type of gel stuff on your bite marks. It's suppose to help, but honestly I'm not sure what it does, which kind of scares me."

Hiccup examined his arm. "Where's my…"

"Oh yeah! We had to take all the stuff off your arm to get to your wounds easier. There over on that chair." Astrid pointed to an old wooden chair sitting in the dark corner Gobber has gotten his supplies from. "Come on. Let's take you home so you can rest up. You can tell me what happened later."

"Sounds good right now."

Astrid and Hiccup flew aside of each other as they made their way back home. Astrid and Hiccup decided to live together in Hiccup's house, since his father certainly would no longer be living in it. The only other person living there was Hiccup's mother, Valka, who was starting over with her son after 20 years of separation. Although his mother wasn't the best cook (heck, she was the worst!), she was still helpful around the house, and often had some good stories about the life she had spent with the dragons, isolated from other Vikings. Besides, how could they kick her out when she had just returned?

Valka hadn't heard the news about her son, and was in for a shocker.

"Welcome back, son!" She said, carrying a tray of some sort of food. She didn't even turn around to see that Astrid was helping Hiccup walk since he was still too weak. "I made breakfast." She looked down at the contents on the wooden tray. "Well, tried." She turned around, dropping her tray when she realized her son was injured. "Oh my! What happened?!" She ran over to her son.

"I'll tell you both later. Right now, I just want to lie down."

"Okay. Just let me help you to bed."

Hiccup now had both arms draped over his wife and mother. Although it made his injured arm hurt, he didn't want to make his mother feel bad for trying to help. When they had made it to the bedroom, they sat Hiccup down on the queen sized bed. He may have been too weak to walk, but he still had the strength to lie down on his own.

"I'll let you be. Rest up." said Valka before kissing her child on the forehead.

"Thanks, Mom."

Astrid came closer to the side of the bed, bending over to give Hiccup her own kiss. "I hope you feel better." she said before leaving Hiccup alone. "_So do I."_ he thought to himself. Hiccup quickly was drawn into a deep sleep.


	3. Ch3 The Scale in the Arm

**A.N- Who's ready for chapter 3, guys? Thanks for the reviews this week, TheDoctorToothless and WarriosOfTwoSouls! Seeing new reviews always cheers me up a little. Not to mention the 21 followers and 10 favorites this story has! Anywho, sorry this chapter is kinda short, but if it makes you feel better, chapter 4 is longer than this (it's even longer than chapter 2)! Alright, I'll let you guys read chapter 3 now. Enjoy! And always Stay Awesome!**

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_**Chapter 3**_

_**The Scale in the Arm**_

The sound of construction and the smell of smoke was all that needed to wake Hiccup from his slumber. He got right out of bed and rushed down the stairs to see if his mother had, for once, burned down the house. Hiccup had a minor coughing fit when he had reached the bottom. It didn't take long for Valka to open the door to let the fumes escape the house. Once it had cleared up, Valka could see that her son was up.

"Ah! Good afternoon, Hiccup! Just in time! Lunch is almost ready!" Valka look towards the ashes left on the medal tray over the fire. "Or maybe not. Oh, well. I expect Astrid will bring us something to eat again. She should be back any minute now."

Hiccup was still groggy from his nap, but slowly waking up. He sat at the empty table standing in the middle of the room, waiting for Astrid's return. While his mother was busy cleaning up their "meal", Hiccup decided to draw in his sketchbook, something he realized he hadn't done in awhile. His drawing looked a lot like a Night Fury, only it had a more transparent look to it and had pupiless eyes. Looking up from his artwork, Hiccup examined his arm. Hiccup turned his head toward his mother who was still sweeping up the ashes before looking back at his arm. Without thinking, he began to unravel the bandage around it. Unfortunately, he was caught by his wife who had just entered the house.

"HICCUP!"

Astrid's shouting startled the Viking, distracting him from what he was doing.

Hiccup chuckled nervously. "Hello, milady."

"Don't you 'Hello, milady' me! You know you should leave your arm alone!"

"Yeah, I know. It just feels like there's a rock or something underneath it."

Astrid sighed. "Fine, we'll look at it after lunch, but then you need to leave it alone!"

"You got it."

Like always, Astrid provided the lunch. It was a simple meal; just some cod fished out from the ocean. Of course, Astrid had to buy some from a local fisherman, but it was worth it. This was defiantly one of their best meals they've had in weeks.

"Thank you for providing the food once again, Astrid." Valka said. "I really need to improve my cooking."

"If you want I can ask my mom to come over and show you a few tricks. She's way better than me. Probably one reason my dad married her."

Hiccup's smile turned flat after hearing that word. Dad. Sometimes he still couldn't believe his father was gone, and hoped one day he'd wake up and see him alive in the kitchen, and that this had been a long dream. It felt unreal, but it was reality. Stoik the Vast would never return to Berk. Never step foot in this house again. Although his memory and blood shall live on, the hearts of many Vikings and friends will continue to have a small hole in the center of their hearts. Hiccup's much larger in diameter.

"Great! I hope soon I'll be able to cook without smoking the house up."

"Don't worry. With my mom, you'll have improved your cooking just like that!" Astrid snapped her fingers.

Hiccup had no idea how long this conversation had continued without him. He almost forgot he had zoned out.

"Alright. Now that we've finished lunch, we can look at your arm."

Hiccup looked at Astrid. "Huh? Oh, yeah."

Astrid could sense something wrong with her spouse, but this time she would let it slide, for now.

"Maybe this is a good thing, you know, checking your arm." continued Astrid. "I mean, who knows what Gobber's slime did to those bite marks."

Hiccup smirked, "See! Guess I was right trying to take this bandage off my arm."

Astrid rolled her eyes and continued to uncover the wounds of her Chief. Her pupils dilated when she could see his bare arm.

Hiccup could see something was wrong just looking at Astrid's washed face. So many thoughts rushed through his head. _"What is it? Are my bite marks infected? Is my flesh falling off? Does my arm need to be amputated? Please don't tell me it needs amputated! I've already lost my leg! I don't want to lose my arm, too! Why aren't you telling me anything! _SAY SOMETHING!_"_

Hiccup was as shocked with himself as Astrid was, having no intentions of screaming that last thought out loud.

"I'm going to KILL Gobber!" was the sentence she chose.

_Oh great! That sounds relieving."_ Hiccup thought sarcastically to himself. "What's wrong?"

"Gobber's 'Healing Gel' apparently causes scales to grow from your bite wounds!"

Confused, Hiccup looked at his arm. A black scale stuck out from the same bite mark the tooth was pulled out of, presumably a Night Fury's.

"Oh that! That's probably just Toothless'. See, I can just pull it right OW!" Hiccup yelped, trying to remove the scale from his arm.

"See! I told you it was Gobber's gel. We're going to him right now!"

"Now hold on! It's probably just stuck or something. Let's just wait a couple…Astrid? What are you doing? No! Don't! Just wait! Please…Ow! Astr-OW! Is this! OW! Really! OW! Necessary?! OUCH!"

With no luck, the black scale remained embedded in Hiccup's arm, no matter how hard Astrid pulled. But thank goodness she stopped. Hiccup was considering smacking his own wife to relieve his pain.

"See! If that was one of Toothless' scales, it probably would have come right out! Don't you see? Gobber's gel is causing your bite marks to grow scales!"

"Do you know how insane that sounds?"

"Well do you know any other theories?" Astrid asked.

Hiccup had been defeated. He couldn't think of anything else that could explain this, but Astrid's idea was just crazy! How could some type of gooey substance cause someone to grow scales on their arm?

Valka cut into their conversation. "Maybe we should get you checked out, son. This could be serious. But instead we should find a real doctor. Not Gobber and his 'Healing Gel'"

"Your mom's right. I think someone who actually knows medical care will be better for you. No offense to Gobber of course, but seriously, you need a doctor's opinion."

"Yeah, probably for the best." replied Hiccup. "But that doctor is not going to say Gobber's 'Healing Gel' caused this! It'll be something that is totally fixable."

At the doctor's house.

"I don't think I can fix it." the doctor, Eira, said with a slight frown.

Hiccup and his companions had shocked and worried looks plastered to their faces. "Really? Are you sure?"

"I'm sorry, Chief, but I've never seen anything like it. Have you ever heard of Viking growing scales before?"

"Well, no, but…"

"But nothing. Again, I'm sorry, but this is out of my practice."

"Could something like, I don't know, some homemade 'Healing Gel' cause this?" asked Astrid.

"I seriously doubt that, Astrid." the doctor replied.

"Told ya!" said Hiccup.

"This was most likely caused by some type of magic. If that's the case, I'm not sure what can be done about it since the knowledge about magic is rare. I truly wish there was something I could do."

Hiccup tried to shrug it off, saying, "Eh, it's only one scale. One won't hurt. Unless, of course, someone were to try pulling it off." He looked directly at his wife.

"Well I hope that it heals properly and wish you best of luck if there was someone else to help you."

"Thanks, Eira." Astrid said.

Their departure was interrupted by the doctor.

"Actually, I think you should ask Gobber for some more of that 'Healing Gel' of his. It's actually healing the wounds quite nicely."

"Wait a minute. How did you know the 'Healing Gel' I was talking about earlier was Gobber's?"

"He brought it in to me once, saying it could help people. But I turned his gel away. Told him I don't want it used on patients until it's been properly tested. I thought it was kind of Gobber to help his neighbors but he has more knowledge in welding and blacksmithing than medicine. I wasn't going to risk anymore damage to my patients. I wish I knew it worked back then. Probably would've healed wounds faster. Maybe save some lives."

"Well, thanks again, Eira." Hiccup said, making his was out the doorway.

"You're welcome, Hiccup. I am truly sorry that I was of so little help."

Hiccup stopped to turn to her and said, "Not much could have been done, I guess." and left.


	4. Ch4 Oh, Dragons

**A.N- Heylo, readers! I know what some of you must be thinking, "Wasn't this suppose to be updated Saturday?" Sorry I forgot to tell you guys but I was gone over the weekend so I wasn't able to post this chapter then. I would've updated this story yesterday, but was kinda gone all day, too, and didn't have access to the computer/internet. But better late than never, right? I'll try to keep my updating pattern to Saturday as planned, but might change as the story goes on like if I didn't finish a chapter in time or something, but I will not give up on this! Anyways, enjoy! P.S. I actually forgot I hadn't posted this chapter yet and was going to post chapter 5. Stay Awesome!**

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_**Chapter 4**_

_**Oh, Dragons**_

The walk back to the on the house on the opposite side of the village was, in one word, silent. None of them even turned their heads to glance at the other beside them. This awkwardness followed them all the way home, but stopped immediately when the door was closed behind after they were all inside.

"WHAT IN ODIN"S GHOST HAPPENED ON THAT ISLAND!"

Caught by total surprise, Hiccup had to find his words before answering his frightening wife.

"What the heck? Have you gone crazy?!" he said, trying to release Astrid's grip, sadly failing.

"You never told me what attacked you on the island you found with Toothless!" Astrid said, with a much calmer voice. "I wanna know what you saw!"

"Alright, alright, I'll tell you, as soon as you release me, that is."

Astrid looked as her hands that forced Hiccup on the wall, now completely realizing what she was doing.

"Sorry!" she quickly apologized, removed her hold in the process.

"Thank you." Hiccup said.

He made his way to sit down at the table before he told his story of the island.

"Me and Toothless were just out flying like usual, trying out some new tricks, practicing that one using my flight suit, when we suddenly ran into this fog. I thought it was just Helheim's Gate, but when we flew in a little further, I could see more land and less stone pillars before the fog got thicker. We flew for about 20 minutes longer looking for a place to land, but then Toothless decided it was time to go back. That's when I saw it. Something shimmering in the mist. Toothless saw it too, and started heading towards it."

"We landed where the shimmer had come from, but it was already gone. We decided to go separate ways to see if we found anything. I'm not sure about Toothless, but while I was looking, I managed to trip and got knocked out when I hit my head on a rock. I'm not sure how long I was out of it, but when I woke back up, I saw two pupiless eyes, watching me. They didn't seem to belong to anything, just floating there, until the fog seemed to morph into a translucent Night Fury. It bared its teeth at me, like it was telling me I was going to die."

"I called for Toothless, but I wasn't sure at the time if he heard me, so I was going to try running away from it, hoping I could lose it in the mist, but it saw right through me like I could it. It rushed at me and bit me in the arm." Hiccup flinched, remembering the excruciating pain he had felt. "Thor, did it hurt. I tried swinging my sword at it but it just went through it like a ghost. I thought I was going to die, but then Toothless came just in time and scared that monster away. That's when we high-tailed it out of there."

Hiccup's mother and wife were both a little horrified at Hiccup's story. Everyone was quiet for a moment or two, but sooner or later the silence had to end.

"What happened to the dragon that attacked you?" asked Valka.

"It seemed to blend back in with the rest of the mist, I guess. I just saw it disappear when Toothless arrived, but I was certain I saw its tail vanish into the fog."

"Why did it do that?" Astrid asked.

"Well, not all dragons are friendly towards Vikings."

"No, I mean why did it run away instead of fight? I mean, like you said, your sword just went straight through it. It knew it couldn't get hurt by Toothless if he attacked, so why surrender?"

Hiccup took a moment to think. "Maybe only dragons can hurt it. That makes sense, right?"

"Well, I guess. But I'm still curious about something else."

"And what's that?"

"Well, it sounded like it was really hard to see in the mist, so it probably took Toothless a little longer to navigate you."

"Yeah. So?"

"So why would that dragon focus so much on your arm and not anywhere else on your body? It didn't sound like it was trying to rip you to shreds."

Hiccup never thought about that. It did seem like the dragon only wanted to hold him in place. But why? Why take up so much time just to continuously bite one spot, of all places, an arm, of his body?

"You're right, Astrid." Hiccup continued. "It was like it was trying to keep me there until it was done. I still don't know why, but it's all I can think of right now."

Hiccup stood up and headed towards the front door. He opened it, letting the mid-afternoon sunlight flood the room, and, without looking back, left the home. Astrid quickly ran after him. She stopped a couple feet away from the house.

"Where are you going?" she shouted to him.

Hiccup turned his head towards her and said, "I need to see if there are any dragons in Gobber's dragon manual that I might have missed when I looked at it when we were still in training. I'll come back right afterwards."

Leaving his wife standing alone, Hiccup continued on his way to the workshop.

When he had arrived there, a long line trailed from the shop, many customers growing impatient. It was hard to get through the crowd near the entrance. When Hiccup succeeded in getting inside, he found Gobber standing in the middle of the workshop, waiting for the wheel to stop at his desired interchangeable hand.

"Ah! Hiccup!" Gobber said when he saw his apprentice. "It's nice to see ya up and goin'. I guess I forgot to tell Astrid you could have the day off, but if you wanna help, you can. I'm not stopping ya."

Hiccup responded, "Thanks, Gobber, but I might take you up on that day off. Do you by chance still have the dragon manual?"

"Why of course I do! Although it makes dragons sound bad, it still has plenty of info on the creatures. It's right over there in that pile if ya want it." Gobber pointed his now hammer hand towards a sunny corner in the room.

"Thanks, Gobber."

Almost tripping over Gobber's lazy dragon, Grump, Hiccup managed to come across a dusty box which showed it hadn't been touched in a while. Digging through it, Hiccup found multiple items, mainly broken axe handles and mangled up bolas, even some of Gobber's old, broken interchangeable hands, but under all of it was the old dragon manual. Hiccup carefully pulled the book out from the box consisting of multiple broken sword tips and knives and got it without a scratch. Hiccup blew the dust off the cover, coughing from the blown particulates.

"Found it!" he said, making his way back to his mentor.

"Good!" Gobber replied. "'Bout time that book be read again."

"When _was_ the last time this book was read?" Hiccup asked, brushing the leftover dust on the book off with his hand.

"Uh… I guess not since that rainy night when you were still in dragon training."

"Around the same time we allied with dragons."

"Yup."

The two stood next to each other a few moments in utter silence. It was soon broken when Hiccup remembered something.

"Hey, I almost forgot. Do you still have some of that gel stuff? Eira said it was healing my wounds nicely."

Gobber smiled. "Why of course, Hiccup! I've got a whole jar full." Gobber went over and took the jar of "Healing Gel" from the table he had left it that morning. Eyeing the table, Gobber was puzzled. "That's funny."

"What?" Hiccup asked.

"There was a tooth in your arm. I took it out and left it here on the table but it's nowhere."

Hiccup's eyes skimmed the wooden surface, only to notice a small puddle of water dripping through the cracks.

"Must've knocked it off." Gobber said. "Oh, well. I'll look for it later. I've got work to do."

"Alright, well, I've got some reading to do." Hiccup replied. He started heading for the exit but was stopped when Gobber began to speak to him once more.

"Why do you wanna read that book, anyway? You've already read it once."

Hiccup said, "Oh, I just wanted to see if the dragon that bit me was in here. And truthfully, I only really looked at the mystery class trying to look up stuff about Night Furies."

"Well alrighty, then. Mind if I take a peek at those injuries? I just wanna see how well they've healed."

"No, no…no." Hiccup panicked. "You see, I, uh, don't want to unwrap my bandages. Wouldn't want to have flimsy bandages wrapped around my arm when I try re-wrapping them." Hiccup chuckled nervously.

"Oh, it's no big deal. I'll just grab some fresh gauze and re-bandage your arm."

"Gauze?"

"Yeah! That's what I call it. Starts with a 'G' like Gobber. Now, come on. Let me see."

Hiccup began backing away. "Oh, no, Gobber. It also kind of hurts when you touch it, so…"

"Oh! Why didn't you just say so, Hiccup? If it makes you feel better, I'll leave it alone."

"Thanks, Gobber. See you later." Hiccup exited the workshop.

"_Sorry, Gobber." _Hiccup thought to himself. _"I think it's best if less Vikings knew about the scale for now."_

Hiccup walked back to his house, waving and saying "hello" as he passed by some fellow Vikings. Hiccup violently scratched at a bothersome itch on the back of his neck, only to be unsatisfied with the continuous itching sensation.

It wasn't long until a certain Night Fury tackled him to the ground, covering the Viking in gruesome layers of saliva.

"Ugh! Toothless! You know that doesn't wash out!" Hiccup shouted.

Toothless stopped licking his master and released him. Hiccup jumped back to his "feet" and attempted to remove the dragon's spit from his clothing. As a punishment for laughing at him, Hiccup smeared the slobber over the Night Fury's face.

"Who's laughing now?!"

Toothless gave him a glare, but began to groom himself afterwards.

"You could have just waited when I got home, but since you didn't, you can give me a ride."

Hiccup walked over to his less-slobbery dragon and hopped onto his back. He quickly changed legs and opened up Toothless' prosthetic tail fin. Soon the two were in the air and making it to the house calmly.

Once at the house, the first to greet the dragon and his rider was Stormfly, Astrid's Nadder. Toothless was so excited to see his dragon friend he forgot to give Hiccup the chance to get off before they played. Hanging on for dear life, Hiccup swung back and for against the movement of the Night Fury. Barely holding a grip, Hiccup continually yelled at his dragon to "STOP!" He felt his life was saved by the blond Viking rushing out of the house to stop her own dragon.

"Stormfly, stop!" Astrid yelled. The Nadder obeyed and stopped in her tracks.

"_Why can't Toothless listen to me like that?"_ Hiccup thought to himself. Luckily for Hiccup, Toothless stopped along with his friend, giving Hiccup a perfect opportunity to get off his dragon before he decided to run off again.

"I'm back!" Hiccup said to Astrid. "In one piece, thanks to you."

Astrid chuckled. "No problem! Stormfly always listens to me."

"I wish Toothless was the same. I mean, he will do as I say, just not all the time."

"Better than some dragons."

"Yeah, that's true."

"So, did you get Gobber's book?"

"Yup. And his 'Healing Gel.'" Hiccup held out the jar of the jelly substance. "Now if you don't mind, I think I'm going to start looking over the dragon manual."

"Alright, but first…" Astrid came closer to Hiccup's face, greeting his lips with hers. "Now you can go." Hiccup smiled as he walked inside while Astrid stayed with the dragons.

Hiccup sat down at the wooden dining table and took the manual out from his vest and opened it to the third page. He read every word on every page, but nothing gave him any clues about the dragon that bit him. The only thing interesting thing he found was a page after the one about Night Furies, which still had little information on the parchment.

It, too, had little on its pages about a mysterious dragon called a Twilight Axelbrity, which the book claims to have been extinct for a hundred years. The pages also read, "Possible relative of the Night Fury." and "It is lightning and death itself." (unlike the Night Fury's description of being the _offspring _of lightning and death itself.) There wasn't even a picture of the beast. _"I wonder what this dragon was like." _Hiccup thought to himself. He read the last of the words the page had to offer. The last line had the same "Hope and pray it does not find you." as did the Night Fury's page.

Before Hiccup could read the rest of the book about dragons he never heard about, the irritable itch crawled again to the back of his neck. Hiccup dug his nails again to the itchy spot, this time getting something under his nail._ "I must've picked a scab."_ He thought. Picking under his nail, he successfully got the hard piece out from underneath and found a small, black scale now being held between his fingers. _"But I never got bit on my neck. Only my arm."_ Hiccup took the jar of "Healing Gel" he had brought home with him and unscrewed the lid. He proceeded to scoop some of the substance out with his fingers and smeared it onto his neck. _"Maybe this will clear it up."_ After wiping his hand on his pants, Hiccup put the jar on a shelf nearby.

Hiccup sat back down to the table to finish his book, but was immediately interrupted again when his loyal Night Fury burst through the door.

"Toothless! What's wrong with you!" He yelled. "You know you're not allowed in the house!"

The content dragon didn't seem to care what Hiccup had to say. All he wanted to do was drag his rider outside so they could fly.

"Oh, come on, Bud! Stop!" Hiccup shouted as Toothless dragged him by his prosthetic leg. Hiccup grabbed onto the frame of the door. "Let go of me!" Toothless found this hilarious.

Soon, Hiccup was free from Toothless' grip, well, sort of. Toothless still had Hiccup's leg in his unsheathed mouth. "Toothless, give it back." Hiccup said, trying to balance on his only leg. Toothless shook his head. "I mean it." Toothless took off running, making gestures that said, "Come and get it!"

Hiccup just stood there. "That's not fair! You have all _four _your legs! I only have one!" Toothless pretended not to hear him, still making laps around the house. "Fine! I guess you don't want to go flying then!" Toothless halted in front of the house, hurrying over to Hiccup to give him his leg back, which was now covered in dragon saliva. Hiccup sighed, "That's not gonna wash out."

Hiccup managed to get most of the slobber off by wiping it in the grass. Using one of Toothless' front legs as a seat, Hiccup reapplied his prosthetic to the stub at the end of his real leg. When Hiccup was sure it was secured, he switched it over to "flying mode" and hopped onto the dragon's back. Toothless spread his wings far apart, ready for lift off. Before he was able to go into midair, Hiccup interrupted him.

"Now I know you just want to fly around like old times, but I'm still Chief and I need to continue to take on my duties. So before we can do all the exciting stuff, we need to go take care of some things, okay?" Toothless grumbled in disappointment. "Sorry, Bud, but you should know the responsibilities about being a leader. After all, you are the Alpha." Toothless sighed, but understood. "Now let's go check up on how we're doing getting rid of the ice."

Soon, the Dragon Master and his Night Fury were heading over to the other side of the island.


	5. Ch5 Rise of an Enemy

**A.N- SORRYSORRYSORRYSORRYSORRYSORRY!I know I was supposed to update my story on Saturday. I just... forgot. Luckily for you, I remembered that I forgot and already had this chapter in Doc Manager so it was all ready to go! I had something else that I wanted to say to y'all's and the rest of the world, but I've been sworn to secrecy. I can't wait to tell the internet this exciting news but it'll have to wait, for now. Anyways, enjoy Chapter 5 and Stay Awesome!**

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_**Chapter 5**_

_** Rise of an Enemy**_

Meanwhile, on a separate and isolated island, there inhabited one to two hundred men, many either moving giant cages, building extra boats, or doing other jobs their master had assigned them. The island smelt of salt water and burnt palm trees.

A young, scrawny 15 year-or-so old boy wearing baggy clothes and a fur vest ran to the small, wooden port at the other end to the island to report to the lone man standing on it.

"Sir," the boy panted, "we're loading the boats up and will be leaving shortly. We're sure to find plenty of dragons this time."

"Good." the larger man said with a low, scratchy voice. His eyes stayed sealed on the ocean. "And you'd best have dragons when you return. You remember the last time you had brought me bad news." The boy flinched, feeling the pain in his back from his punishment when he had told him last time they didn't find any dragons. "Next time, you may not be so fortunate. Now go!" The boy did as he was told and ran off, stumbling over his own feet. "Clumsy child." the man mumbled.

The man looked down at the waters beneath him, watching as large bubbles came to surface. Below them could be heard a low rumbling noise, which emitted more bubbles above. "Don't worry." he said to the waters. We shall have our revenge, and you shall be Alpha once more."

A dozen or so men were now sailing on the open blue, a few miles from the shores of their new location. The skies were clear, besides a couple clouds that floated above. This upset the sailors. "Uh! If we don't bring back dragons this time, we're sure to lose our heads!"shouted one of the Vikings, presumably their leader.

He was very muscular, and wore a black v-neck that had two bear claws for buttons. Draped over his shirt lay a red and orange colored vest, most likely made from a Nightmare's skin. He had brown, greasy hair that went a little past his shoulders and evidence of a beard starting to form on his chin. On his left arm was a tattoo of a serpent-like dragon with a sword piercing through its heart. On the leather belt that hung around his wasted was a pouch that contained a dagger, handmade from Nightmare's tooth, probably the same one that covered his shoulders.

"We know, Avis," a short man named Ug said. "but it's hard to find dragons if we're just waiting for them to come to us! Why not sail to an island and look for dragons there?"

"I doubt you men are ready for that." Avis said. "If you're untrained, you're most vulnerable to dragons on their land. What if there are, say, Hobblegrunts on an island? They can easily blend in to their background. Or perhaps you'd like to take on a Whispering Death with nothing but a small dagger in your pocket? You see where I'm going with this?"

Ug nodded.

"But since there are obviously no dragons flying around, I guess we'll have to land somewhere with dragons. Does anyone know where the closest island is?"

None of the sailors spoke, until one scrawny head poked up from below deck. "I think there's an island to the north. I think it's only a few miles away from here."

"Excellent." Avis said with a grin. "Let's set a course!"

The men scattered to their positions and turned the boat so they would be headed North, as the scrawny boy had told them.

As they got nearer to the island, they found themselves caught in a thick fog. The men no longer knew if they were headed towards the island.

"Great! Just our luck!" Avis shouted. "How are we suppose to find and capture dragons if we can't even see our own hands in front of us in this mist?!"

"Calm down, Avis." The scrawny boy said.

"Calm down?!" Avis yelled, locating the source of the voice. "Don't you dare tell me to CALM DOWN!" Avis found the boy near the edge of the boat, grabbing him by the collar of his blue tunic and hanging him over the splashing waters below.

Struggling, the boy quickly said, "What I meant w-was that m-maybe the fog will l-lighten up." The boy, bracing himself of crashing into the cold water, was surprised to feel his feet land on a hard, wooden surface.

"Next time, I'm throwing you overboard. Got that, Toothpick?"

"My name is Brant! It means 'Sword.'"

"Eh, Toothpick suits you better." Avis and others nearby laughed. Brant's cheeks burned red with anger. If it wasn't for Avis' rank and intimidating structure, Brant would have yelled back at the arrogant monstrosity.

A huge thud caused many of the crewmen to fall over. Avis, one of the men who didn't fall, took this as a good sign.

"Alright, men! Gather your gear and we'll head out!"

One by one, the Vikings made their way down the ramp from the boat to the shore. When he noticed a certain scrawny teen making his way down, Avis grabbed the back of Brant's shirt and pulled him back onto the deck.

"Not you." he said. "We need someone to watch the ship, plus we can't risk any dragons from escaping because of _somebody's _destructive nature."

"Oh come on! I'm not _that_ destructive! Besides, Hoark's watching the ship and probably doesn't need any help."

"I said no!" Avis began walking down the ramp.

"Please!" Brant fell to his knees. "I want to prove myself! Not just to Drago, but to you, as well!"

Avis growled, but knew he wouldn't stop until his wishes were granted. "Ugh, fine!" Brant's face lit up. He dashed down the ramp and leapt onto the sandy shore of the island. Trying to catch up with the rest of the crew, Brant was grabbed again by the back of his shirt. Avis looked down at him with his cold, grey eyes. "But I want you to stick with me. I need to keep my eye on you."

Brant's smile faded. He wanted to object, but instead put his head down in defeat. "Alright." He dragged his feet as he continued to follow the dragon trapper.

So far, no one had found any dragons in the blinding fog. Only once or twice a man saw something shimmer in the mist, which turned out to be nothing.

"Come on, Toothpick! You're slowing me down!"

The small teen jogged up to where Avis was standing, slightly out of breath. "I told you! My name is Brant!"

"And now it's Toothpick! Get used to it!"

Brant stared coldly at his leader when Avis turned his back to him.

Because his mind was clouded by his hatred towards the man, Brant hadn't realized his foot had hit a rock, causing his to fall, his head hurtling towards another rock on the ground. Luckily, his hands fell against the ground, stopping his head from hitting the stone. However, he thought he must've injured himself when he saw blood on the surface of the stone. But when he checked himself, he saw that he was uninjured. _"This isn't mine." _he thought. Looking again at the rock, he realized the blood was dried.

"Avis! I think I've found something!"

Avis came over to where the boy had fallen. "What is it? Dragon tracks?"

"No. Blood. Dried blood. Someone else was here, and are rather injured or dead. I think we should turn back."

Avis looked down at the boy. "What?! This is a good sign!"

"A _good _sign?"

"If someone was injured, there might be dragons on this island after all."

"B-but that means this person was attacked by a dragon."

"Yeah, so?" Avis didn't give Brant a chance to answer. "We're trappers! We were trained to take on dragons. This guy was probably a weakling, like you."

Brant ignored the insult and proceeded to get up. Next to a boulder close by he found a patch of grass stained with more dried blood, most likely from the same victim. Evidence showed that someone must have been bleeding out in this spot. _"This _had_ to be caused by a dragon attack"_

"There's more blood over here, Avis! Someone was definitely attacked. Avis?"

The teen found the older dragon trapper staring at a round patch of burnt grass not too far away from where he'd found the blood.

"Everything, alright?"

"Only once have I seen dragon fire leave burns like this. And it was less than a year ago."

"During your guys' raid on that dragon island?" Brant asked.

Avis nodded. "Same black dragon who took out many of our traps and catapults. I can still remember the shear, whistling noise it made when it flew by. I can still see the blue plasma blasts that shot out from its mouth, almost killing our own. I remember the man that rode on its back, a helmet hiding his face, his left leg replaced with an artificial one. The son of Stoik the Vast."

"Wait a minute. This was caused by a Night Fury? Is there any chance another one still exists?"

Avis shook his head. "I doubt it. This was made by the same dragon that blasted our Alpha's tusk right off. The blood must have been from the so called 'Dragon Master.'"

Their conversation ended when out of the fog appeared a translucent Terrible Terror with a pair of pupiless orbs as eyes. The Terror growled, causing Avis to laugh at the sad excuse for a dragon. The dragon took a stance, teeth sheathed at the tall man before it. Avis took a rope out from his pocket opposite of his sword. "Well, we do need dragons." Unexpectedly, the dragon pounced, knocking Avis to the ground. For the first time in years, fear grew in Avis' eyes. The Terrible Terror opened its mouth, razor sharp teeth spiking out of its gums. It aimed towards the trapper's right shoulder. The dragon was stopped when a skinny 15 year old boy out of nowhere hurled himself at the small dragon, somehow managing to knock the dragon off the pinned body.

A loud yelp came out of the boy when he realized he had kicked the dragon in its mouth, its teeth accidentally being dug into the flesh of his leg. Surprised, the dragon pulled its teeth out of the boy and vanished into the fog, leaving a small molar in one of his open wounds.

"Brant!" Avis shouted, seeing the injured boy grip his bloody leg. He got up and ran over to where he sat. "Are you ok?"

"It hurts!" He replied.

Avis examined the boy's leg. He pulled out the small tooth he'd found and threw it onto the ground. "It doesn't look too deep, but then again, the dragon wasn't aiming for you." Avis helped Brant to his feet, putting his arm over his shoulder for support. "Come on, let's take you back to the ship. You've proven yourself."

As the two made their way to the ship, neither of them seemed to notice the tooth shrink into a puddle of water.


	6. Ch6 Scales, Scales, and More Scales

**A.N- If I forget to update on Saturday again, I'm just gonna start updating chapters when I can/want to. Instead of updating on a different day this week, I've decided to just wait until today to update. I thought of posting two chapters today for skipping out last week, but now I might not, seeing I haven't even finished chapter 8 yet, so I'll probably wait until next week or so to post chapter 7. Sorry! Who know? Maybe if I get chapter 8 done before then, I'll post it earlier. Enjoy chapter 6! Stay Awesome! **

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_**Chapter 6**_

_**Scales, Scales, and More Scales**_

"Alright, let's get this part over here!" shouted Snotlout. The other dragon riders positioned their dragons towards the place Snotlout was motioning towards. "A little to the right, Fishlegs! We don't want any ice crashing down over any houses!"

"Sorry!" Fishlegs and Meatlug hovered to the right as they were told.

"Looks great! Alright, on the count of three, we blow this oversize popsicle! Ready?!"

"Ready!" they all answered in unison.

"Okay! One…two…th…"

"You guys should angle yourselves more to the left! You'll blow off more ice that way!"

"Hi, Hiccup!" shouted the twins. Hiccup waved to his friends.

Toothless continued to hover over next to Snotlout's dragon, Hookfang. "So, how's it going?" Hiccup asked his friend.

"It's going pretty well, I guess." Snotlout responded. "We still have lots of ice to get rid of, though. What were you saying earlier?"

"Well, you're trying to get the ice to fall into the water, right?" Snotlout nodded. "Well right now you guys are aiming more at the tip of the icicle. You turn your dragons more to the left, you could break off more, still causing no damage to any buildings, of course."

"Oh, oh I see it, now! Thanks."

"Anytime."

"Alright, guys and gals, let's turn those dragon a little to the left!"

The dragon riders did so and were now pointed at a thicker part of the shard of ice. Snotlout turned his head towards Hiccup. "Would you like to do the honors, Chief?"

"Alright, on the count of three! One…two…" the dragons' throats began to fill with gas, igniting it when Hiccup yelled, "THREE!" Immediately, all the dragons, except Toothless, released their balls of fire and blasted the middle of the icicle, cracking it halfway though. Mouth growing blue, Toothless released his own powerful plasma blast at the chunk of ice, splitting it from the rest of the glacier. The dragons and their riders cheered when they had heard a loud crash of water below where the ice had fallen.

"Woohoo!"

"Yeah!"

"Alright!"

"Good job, guys!" Snotlout shouted. Clapping, Snotlout turned to Hiccup to thank him, but hadn't when he saw something black on the back of his neck. His smile faded into a face of concern. "What's that?" he asked.

Hiccup turned his head, hiding the scales from, Snotlout's sight. "What's what?"

"That stuff on your neck."

"Oh, that? It's just a rash." he lied.

"Some rash." Snotlout replied.

Astrid and Stormfly flew over to the two, butting into their conversation. "What're you guys talking about?"

"Oh, nothing." Snotlout answered her. "I was just pointing out Hiccup's nasty rash."

"What? What rash?"

"Didn't you know? He has it behind his neck."

Astrid turned her attention towards her husband, eyes full of anger. "No, I didn't"

Hiccup immediately spoke. "I just found out about before I left to help you guys. Don't worry about it! I smeared some of Gobber's 'Healing Gel' on it."

"That stuff works?"

"Let me see it." Astrid commanded.

"What? Why?" Hiccup asked.

"If it's nothing to worry about, why are you so concerned about letting me see it?"

"I'm not! I was just curious!"

"I just want to see it for myself!"

"You don't have to..wait..you don't.. oh!" but Astrid had already climbed onto Toothless' back and was examining the "rash." She did her best to hide her worried expression when she found a dozen or so black scales on the back of his neck.

"I think it looks more serious than you think." she said, hopping back onto her Nadder. "You should go to Eira. She'll probably know what to do."

Hiccup played along. "You're probably right. I'll visit her later."

"Um, why not now?" Astrid asked, hoping she could talk to her husband in private.

"I think I've had a long enough break from restoring Berk. The sun's starting to set and the only thing I've done for the village today was break a piece of ice."

"A big piece of ice." Snotlout pointed out.

"Still, I think I'll help out a little more before seeing the doctor."

"Fine." Astrid said, before mouthing, _"I still want to talk to you later."_ When Snotlout wasn't looking.

"Thank you. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go check on house repairs. Bye!" and just like that, Hiccup and Toothless were gone, leaving the others to finish off the ice.

In a matter of minutes, Hiccup had arrived at one of the few homes left that needed care, besides the ones that were covered in ice. Toothless began to hover over where some Vikings were working on the roof, grabbing the workmen's attention towards the painted sky. "Ah! Good evening, Chief!" said one of the Vikings, red beard split into two ponytails.

"Good evening! How're the repairs?"

"Slow, but we're getting things fixed." said another with dark brown hair and a two-horned helmet.

"Well that's good. Need any help?"

"I think we've got it, but if you don't mind, you can take some of these tools over to Spitelout and his men. They might need some help, as well."

"Sure, no problem."

One of the men got up from his work and went over to a wooden box with multiple tools handy when fixing up some broken homes. The tall, blond man with his long beard in three braids lifted up the toolbox over his head for the hovering Toothless to reach, who gripped firmly on the handle with his two, front feet.

"Well, I'll see ya all later!" Hiccup shouted before departing.

"See ya, Chief!"

"Thanks again!"

Hiccup and Toothless headed north, where they'd expect to see Spitelout and his men fixing the roof and walls of his own home. As predicted, Spitelout was on the roof, yelling at his other fellow Vikings to "Make this part more secure! I don't want the ceiling to fall in on my wife and son!"

"Good evening, Spitelout!"

Spitelout turned to find his late friend's son flying over on his prized Night Fury, carrying a box of tools in his claws.

"I believe these are for you." Toothless dropped the toolbox in front of him, causing a small ruckus of clanks from the colliding tools.

"Finally!" exclaimed Spitelout. "I asked for these hours ago, those lazy scoundrels!"

"Well, I wouldn't call them lazy. They're almost finished with that one house on the other side of the village."

"They're finally finishing it up, huh? They've been working on the same house ever since Drago and his 'ice breather' caused havoc in our village."

"Well, houses don't get fixed over night, and there was a lot of damage done."

Spitelout ended the conversation, knowing he would have been defeated. He also couldn't help but notice something on the back of Hiccup's neck. "Are..are you alright?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, from here at least, it looks like you have something on your neck."

Hiccup rubbed his hand against the back of neck, feeling the course patch of scales growing from his flesh. "Oh that? It's just a rash."

"You want me to take a look at it?"

"No, no. I was..uh..actually..um..going..to see Eira tomorrow, so..no."

"Well ok then, I think."

"So, you need any help?"

"Well, actually, we were just finishing for the day. You're welcome to help out tomorrow, though. That is, if you're sure you can handle it. You might want to rest a little while longer. Dragon bites don't heal so quickly."

"I'm sure I'll be…wait a..how did you know I got attacked by a dragon?"

"Snotlout told me."

"Oh..right. Of course…I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Sure. See ya tomorrow."

After the two said their goodbyes, Hiccup and Toothless headed back to their humble abode. He only just hoped Astrid forgot what she saw and that they could discuss this later. When they arrived at the front of their home, Hiccup was first to be greeted by his wife. "Hiccup, may I have a word with you?" She remembered. Hiccup sighed, but got off his dragon and followed her to the shaded side of the house.

"What's wrong with your neck? It had a patch of scales on it!" Astrid said in a hushed whispered.

"I honestly can say I have no idea." he replied. "Earlier today I had an obnoxious itch on the back of my neck and thought it was fine until I managed to scratch off a scale. Right after I met up with you and the others."

"Hiccup, do you think that maybe that dragon did this to you?"

"I..was…considering it."

"Well, it just seems like the best explanation. I mean, you said it took the form of a Night Fury, the scales on your neck and arm are obviously Night Fury scales, and it held you in place instead of ripping you to shreds. The last part sounds like a dragon that likes to do something to its victims."

"You're probably right. Eira said it was most likely caused by magic and no Viking knows the magical properties of dragons. Not even me. Plus I've never seen a dragon like this before. I mean, come on. A dragon made from fog? That definitely sounds like magic to me!"

"Exactly! Which is why we'll figure this out. And if you don't mind, I think we should re-inspect your arm tomorrow. I'm not sure if there's still only one scale on it."

"Yeah, probably for the best." Hiccup had another conclusion concerning the scales and the dragon, but decided to mentally store the thought away for now until he had more evidence- even if the evidence presented now was overwhelming, but he needed to be sure.

"Well, your mother's probably waiting, we should go inside. But first…" Astrid turned Hiccup around, his back now facing his wife. Astrid played around with Hiccup's hair, trying to get it to cover the scales as much as possible. When some still peeked out from underneath, she then tried to adjust his collar to cover the rest. "There, now they're hidden, well, for the most part. I was guessing you wouldn't want your mom knowing about this."

Hiccup turned to face her again, his pine-green eyes meeting her sky-blue ones. "Not yet, anyway."

When the conversation ended, they both went around to the front door. When Hiccup opened the door for Astrid to enter first, they were both embraced with a thick cloud of smoke. The two coughed on the fumes, along with Valka who at the same time was trying to put out the burning remains of leftover cod. When the smoke had cleared up, she noticed the couple standing in the doorway, both having a coughing fit. "I think I'll ask your mother for her cooking expertise tomorrow." Both immediately nodded in agreement.

"_This must be where I got my destructive trait."_ Hiccup thought to himself.


	7. Ch7 Welcome to Berk

**A.N- Hello! Who's ready for chapter 7?! Well, hopefully you are, because here it is! And guess what day it is. Saturday! Yay! She updated it on time! It's probably a good thing I already had this chapter done because I still haven't finished chapter 8 yet. I kinda forgot that this past week was the end of my school's 3rd quarter so I've been pretty busy (and stressed) this week. But since it's now spring break, I'll have plenty of free time to finish it out since y family made no plans. If I still don't get it done, then shame on me. Anyways, enjoy! And Stay Awesome!**

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_**Ch**__**apter 7**_

_**Welcome to Berk**_

The next morning, Hiccup awoke from the high screeches and growls of Terrible Terrors on the roof. Astrid must've been awake already by the signs of her empty side of the bed. She always was an early bird. Making his way down the stairs to meet her, he noticed her absence when seeing her chair at the table was empty. _"She must've taken off to help with the ice." _he thought. _"I guess I better go help Spitelout out at his house."_

Before exiting the house, Hiccup thought of a way to better hide the scales on his neck, which haven't grown much since yesterday. Taking a strip of bandage, he smeared some "Healing Gel" on one side before placing the slimy side of it onto the back of his neck. His idea succeeded when the cloth stuck to his neck, the gel acting as glue.

When Hiccup walked outside, expecting to be greeted by Toothless, he found the yard empty. He figured the Night Fury must've gone to one of the feeding stations and began traveling to Spitelout's on foot. Not too long into his walk over, Hiccup was given an unpleasant greeting when someone ran into him and knocked both of them onto the ground. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I wasn't paying attention!" quickly said a high feminine voice.

"That's ok." replied Hiccup. "I've done worse damage." He looked up to the one responsible for their fall, but could only see the silhouette of the person above him with the sun behind. The only part of the body he could see clearly was the small hand reaching out to help him up, which he gladly accepted. Now standing on both his real and artificial foot, he could now see the features of the teenage girl standing in front of him.

She looked to be at least 16 years of age. She stood a little over his shoulders and had long, messy dark brown hair that didn't even seem to be decorated with a braid. Her hair matched with her chocolate brown eyes surrounded by a freckle-free face. She wore a teal, obviously worn out tunic with a dark brown vest, most likely made from bear skin. Her legs were covered with torn black pants and wore an old pair of light brown boots that were decorated with holes. The only thing that didn't seem worn out and in need of attention was the necklace wore around her neck, which looked to be a dragon's tooth, presumably a Terrible Terror's. The only other thing that surprised Hiccup other than her slightly feral appearance was her unfamiliar face.

"Have we ever met? I don't recognize you."

She shook her head. "No, none of you would. I'm actually from another village. I was just on my way to see the Chief, who someone told me was that way, to see if he'd let me stay."

"Well, you've found him. I'm actually Berk's Chief."

Her eyes widened. Now she felt guiltier for running into him. Good first impression! "O..oh. I..I..I'm really s..sorry f..ff..for running i..int..to you." She stuttered. She was sure he would have turned her down in the first place. If not then, now he definitely would. But she was surprised by his next response.

"That's alright. People make mistakes. I guess I should be the first to say, 'Welcome to Berk!'"

Her mouth was agape. She had gone to other villages to hopefully find her place and every chief turned her down, and not politely either. "Wait, what?! I can stay? Just like that?" Hiccup nodded. She was so happy, the first thing she did was cling her arms around his neck and embrace him in a hug. She soon let go when she realized she was suffocating him, apologizing for the third time.

"So, what's your name? Hiccup asked when he could breathe again.

"Dyina. Dyina Hopinskin." She happily replied.

"Well, nice to meet you, Dyina. I'm Hiccup." He shook his hand with hers. "I'd like to stay and chat but I've got houses to repair. You're free to tag along. Maybe we can introduce you to Gobber on our way. He may even give you a job." Dyina wasn't 100% sure of what he was talking about, but figured she'd soon find out. But before they could travel deeper into the village, they'd first have to go around the Night Fury blocking their way.

Dyina's eyes went wide as saucers at the sight of the magnificent beast, who hadn't noticed them behind his back. "Oh yeah," said Hiccup. "Probably should have mentioned something to you." Hearing his rider's voice, Toothless spun around and tackled Hiccup to the ground, drenching his face in a thick coat of saliva.

"Oh my gods!" Dyina shouted when the dragon had attacked. Although she carried no weapon, she would do her best to save the Chief. She charged at the Night Fury and jumped on his back, trying to pull him away from the man on the ground. Toothless had noticed the extra weight on his back and stepped away from Hiccup to see what it was. It was hard for him to turn his head so far, but did catch the sight of some tangled, brown hair. "Don't hurt him!" Dyina continued to shout. She didn't realize the dragon had retreated from his human until she saw Hiccup standing next to her, covered in spit.

Seeing her confused glance, Hiccup told her, "Here at Berk, we have dragons as our friends."

She quickly looked back at the dragon, who looked to be smiling at her. "Oh, sorry." She said to Toothless as she climbed off. She turned back to Hiccup, who was now trying his best to wipe off the dragon's slobber. "So dragons are like your guys' pets?" Hiccup nodded, embracing himself for her next reaction. "AWESOME!" Okay, so maybe he didn't expect _that_ response.

"You're not scared?" he asked, patting Toothless on the head.

"Of course not! I think dragons are cool! I've been fascinated by them ever since I was really little, even after the times I was almost blasted to death during raids! And a Night Fury? They're probably one of my favorites!"

Hiccup never imagined the day he would meet a stranger who was _this_ into dragons. He wasn't even like this at his age! And to think she'd be afraid of Toothless. _Wait a minute_. "How did you know Toothless was a Night Fury?"

Her smile began to sag as she tried to think of a reason why. "Oh…umm…hmm…" was the response Hiccup got from her. "I don't really know. Maybe I've seen it in a book or something. If I did, it's been awhile."

Hiccup wasn't really sure if she was telling the whole truth, but forgot about it. If she was going to be part of their tribe, he needed to learn to trust her. "Ok then. Since Toothless is here with us, would you like a ride?"

Dyina couldn't resist. "Yes!"

Hiccup switched his leg to "flying mode" before hopping aboard the saddle of his dragon. Locking his prosthetic in place, he proceeded to help Dyina onto the spot behind him. "Alright." he said. "Hold on tight!" and they were up over the buildings with the Viking below. Hiccup couldn't help but smile at the girl's face when she looked down at all the dragons on the roofs.

The two soon arrived at Gobber's workshop, which was a slow morning of business.

"Morning, Gobber!" Hiccup shouted from outside.

The blond, peg-legged Viking hobbled out to greet the Chief. "Mornin', Hiccup." he said. "Come to help in the workshop today, I see."

"Sorry, Gobber. I told Spitelout I'd help finish repairing his house, but I did bring someone who might be able to work with you." Hiccup climbed down from the Toothless' back, revealing the teenager who was sitting behind him.

"Who's this?" Gobber asked.

"This is Dyina." Hiccup replied, helping the girl down.

"When did she get here?"

"This morning." she said. "The sun wasn't even up, yet."

"How did you get here?"

Hiccup was thinking of answering for her, but wasn't even sure himself. "Yeah, how?"

Dyina's heart beat accelerated. "I had a boat." she lied. "It kinda got beat up on the way here. This was its last trip. I landed over on the other side of the island on the beach."

"Dyina, I meant to ask earlier, but are you with anyone else?" Hiccup had a guess of what her answer would be, but was a little sad when it was proven correct with a shake of her head. How could a girl so young be left on her own? That explains her gruesome look.

"Well come on in." Gobber said to her. "Let's get ya more presentable. No 'fense, but your attire isn't exactly, um, pleasant."

"Yeah, I know. These were the only clothes I have."

"Well, not fer long. Follow me."

"See ya, Hiccup!" Dyina waved goodbye.

Hiccup waved back before getting back on his dragon. "Come on, bud. Let's get to Spitelout's before he gets _too_ impatient." Immediately, the duo took to the skies.

Back in the workshop, Gobber had found some articles of clothing in some of his boxes and handed them to Dyina, whom which they didn't fit. Luckily for her, her mother had showed her how to sow when she was little and could still remember how to do some things. Grabbing a needle and thread, she began revising the pieces of clothing into more fitting and somewhat more fashionable clothes.

While she poked the needle back and forth into the fabric, she couldn't to think about her response in how she got here. I mean, it wasn't a complete lie. The event did happen once in her life, just not recently. She couldn't tell him the actual way she had gotten there, at least not yet. Even though these people lived with dragons, she wasn't sure if they'd accept her if she told them, mainly Hiccup, the truth.

She was drawn away from her thoughts when she felt something sharp poke her finger, creating a small drop of blood. She decided to focus back on her work to avoid being pricked by the needle again. She had other worries in her life that needed attention, such as getting this done and later looking for shelter to take refuge under.


	8. Ch8 Shrink a Dink

**A.N- Okay, so I think I'm at least going to try updating the story on weekends since I obviously am not updating every Saturday like I said I would. Sorry this chapter is a little shorter than usual, but at least it's something. And truthfully, I didn't work on the story much during Spring Break because 1.)I made some last minute plans to stay with my sister at her house, 2.)On Monday and Wednesday, I still needed to help with my school play (I'm crew, not cast), and 3.)I've been kinda lazy (which is why I still have some homework to do after posting this). But I was able to finish this tonight, so enjoy! I thought it was a good idea to catch up with our dragon trappers soon, so soon is now. And as always, Stay Awesome!  
**

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_**Chapter 8**_

_**Shrink a Dink**_

Avis and his men finally arrived back to the island just before sunset. Brant sat alone on the wooden floor of the boat with his injured leg extended out. Avis had ripped of part of his sweaty shirt and bits of torn netting as a bandage to slow the bleeding of the bite. Even though Brant appreciated Avis' care and affection, he still thought Avis was overreacting. "Relax, Avis. I'm fine." he said. "It barely hurts."

"Ha!" exclaimed Avis, rewrapping Brant's handmade bandage. "When I was carrying you to the ship, you were nearly crying from the pain."

"Correction, you _helped _me onto the ship. And I was nowhere near crying."

"Yeah, right. And for your information, I don't buy the 'I have something in my eye' excuse."

Brant rolled his eyes. "Ok, so my eyes might have watered a bit, but seriously, I'm fine. It only stings a little."

"I don't care. I need you to heal as quickly as possible, and not just for me, but for Drago, as well."

"Speaking of Drago," said Brant, "How are you gonna explain to him that we didn't find any dragons."

Avis sighed. "I guess I'll just sail out with the rest of the men on a night search."

"Night? Are you sure that's a good idea?"

"Relax, Toothpick." Avis reassured. "We're not going on any islands. Dragons usually fly more when the sun's set."

"_Great. He still calls me 'Toothpick'" _Thought Brant. "That's what I'm worried about. How do you know you won't run into a swarm of dragons?"

"Well, if that happens, we'll try to catch as many as you can."

"That's not what I..Oh, forget it."

An hour or so passed when the ship had met the docks of the island. None of the sailors had left and no one tied up the boat. The only two that rose from their positions were Avis and Brant. Seeing the pain in his face from the pressure on his leg, Avis offered his services to help the limping boy to a safe place to rest.

"Why are you slouching?" he asked the smaller Viking, adjusting his arm to meet Brant's needs.

"What are you talking about?" Brant asked. "I'm not slouching."

"Uh huh."

"No, really. See?" Brant took himself out from under Avis' arm and stood up as straight as he could, trying not to let the pain in his leg interrupt his stance. Looking down at the boy, Avis found him standing at the same height as he had been under his arm.

"Then did you shrink or something? You're shorter than you were when I had helped you on that island."

"I don't think so. I'm 5'5"."

"Hmm…Come with me." Avis took the collar of Brant and dragged him back to one of the huts, presumably his. Dropping the boy onto a stump, Avis said, "Wait here." before entering the home. A few minutes later the dragon trapper returned with a sturdy, thick branch.

"What's that for?" Brant asked.

Avis rotated the branch to reveal small marks going up the branch. "This is what my mother used to measure me and my brother as we grew up. I kept it to use on my own sons someday. Stand up."

Brant did as he was told and stood from the stump. Avis placed the sliced end of the branch onto the ground and stood it just behind the boy's head. Taking his knife from its pouch, the larger Viking scratched a line next to the mark that met Brant's height.

"You see that?" Avis pointed to the nick he just made. Brant turned around. He first looked at where his leader's finger laid before looking up towards the man, waiting for him to respond. "This notch here means you're 4'8"."

"What?! You're lying!"

"Don't you dare call me a liar!" He yelled, causing the boy to fall back onto his log. A small twig left on the bark ripped the handmade bandage on his leg. Avis sighed at his ruined work. "Hold on. I'll get some more binding from the house."

After returning back outside, Avis kneeled down in front of Brant and brought his knife to the unripped parts of the bandage still around his injured leg. As the bits of cloth and netting fell down, Avis' eyes were greeted with a strange sight.

"What the..?"

Brant's facial expression was now one of worry. "What is it? Is it infected?"

Avis' eyes didn't leave its spot. "I don't think so, unless this is some other form of infection I've never heard of."

"What?" The young Viking looked down to what Avis had been looking at. He noticed something green in the incision of his leg. It was a scale, and by the size, most likely a Terrible Terror's. "Is it from the dragon that attacked you?"

"No." Avis responded. "That dragon's scales were almost transparent." He tried to pull the scale from the wound, but quickly let go when the Brant groaned at the pain. "Sorry."

"That's okay." He said. "Just get it out. Quickly."

Avis tried, but found it hard to remove the scale. He also noticed with every tug increased Brant's pain. "I think it's stuck."

"How can it be stuck?" Brant asked. "It's just a tiny, little..Ow!" He regretted trying to take it out himself.

"That's odd." said Avis. "It's almost as if it were attached to you." An idea popped into his mind. "Come on!" He began to drag the boy by the arm, forgetting about the bandage meant for his leg.

"Where are we going?" Brant asked.

"To Drago."

Brant cringed at the thought of seeing the man again. "What about the dragons?"

Avis stopped and surveyed the area. Leaving Brant in his spot, he hurried over to a tall, masculine Viking resting against a dragon's trap. "Baldwin!" The bearded man straightened up as he approached. "I need you to tell my men to go ahead without me." Avis said, pointing in the direction of the boat. "I need to talk to Drago. Tell Hoark he's in charge." Baldwin nodded and ran towards the ship. The other two dragon trappers made their way in the opposite direction to the spot where Drago was usually found.

Avis and Brant slowed their pace as they began to approach their master, who they could here softly talking towards the sea. "Master Drago." Avis said, making himself known. The older man turned around to show his scarred face towards the younger two.

"Why have you come?" Dragon asked. "Have you returned with dragons?"

Both Avis' and Brant's hearts accelerated in heart beats. "Not yet. But I've sent my men on a night hunt."

Drago walked slowly towards the two, causing them both to take a step or two backwards. "Why aren't you with them? After all, you are one of my bests."

Avis relaxed himself. "You see, Master Drago," he began, "we tried to look for some dragons on an island, but we came across something strange."

"Go on."

"Well, it was a dragon but at the same time it wasn't. Now that I think of it, I believe this dragon was created from the fog. It tried to attack me, but luckily for me, Toothpick over here threw himself at the devil and caused the beast to run away. Unfortunately, Brant was accidentally bit, but here's the weird thing." Avis walked over the short, scrawny boy and pointed to the scale in his open wound. "He's growing a scale in his bite mark. And he's gotten shorter. Have you ever seen anything like this?"

Drago waited a moment before answering, but said, "No. But I suggest we monitor any other changes in the boy. Put him in one of the cages, just in case."

"What?"

"Wait, Drago." spoke Avis. "Why don't I watch after him? He has been helpful on the ship."

Drago was annoyed at him for not following direct orders, but with a grumble, he replied, "Fine! For now, he may stay with you, but if his condition worsens, he goes into one of the traps."

"Thank you, Drago. Come on, Brant. Maybe the crew hasn't left yet."

Drago turned back to the sea, pondering on the strange happening of his small trapper. But putting his thoughts aside, he began to go over his plan for revenge again in his head.

Running as fast as they could to the docks, they found the ship still floating where they had left it, but saw the men preparing to leave. "Wait! WAIT!" Avis shouted. Like that, the sailors froze in place, watching Avis and Brant run up to the boat. As the two climbed aboard, Avis began shouting orders. "Alright, I'm back in charge! Get the sails ready, we're heading north! You know what to do! Let's go!" All men on deck rushed to make their last minute preparations before setting sail.

"What do you want me to do?" asked Brant.

"Right now, I want you below deck."

"But, but what about that thing you told Drago. You know, how I've 'been helpful on the ship' thing?"

Avis sighed. "I wasn't lying. I just don't have a job for you right now. Please, go below deck, will you?"

Brant sighed. "Fine."

"Thank you. But before you go." Avis took the scrawny Viking by the shoulders and put his back up against one of the pillars used for the sails. "Stand up straight."

"Why?"

"Just do it."

Rolling his eyes, Brant did so. From his pocket, Avis took out a piece of charcoal and made a small line above Brant's head. "Drago told me to monitor any changes, so I will, starting with any changes in height." Brant turned around and looked at the mark Avis made before he was told to "get below deck."


	9. Ch 9 Dragon Talk

**A.N.- I have returned! Sorry this took soo long to upload. Some of you, I know at least one person out there was looking forward to this chapter, so TADA! Enjoy! Again, sorry for the long wait. Over summer, some days, I was just not in the mood to type, and then there was the time period where I lost the flash drive that I keep all my stories (I'm a weirdo who for some reason doesn't have them saved onto an actual computer). You have no idea how happy I was when I found it. I've also been working on a non-fanfiction story, as well, but I really want to see this story make it to the end, so that's the goal. I'm making good progress on chapter 10, so I hope that'll be ready soon, but until then, here's this chapter, so have a good day, and STAY AWESOME!**

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_**Chapter 9**_

_**Dragon Talk**_

Working on Spitelout's house didn't take as long as expected, at least that's how it felt. By the time the job was done, everybody was ready for lunch.

"Come on, Toothless!" Hiccup spoke to his dragon. "I could go for some salmon. How about you?" Coincidentally, one of the Vikings nearby shouted "Let's go!" at the same time Toothless grumbled back to Hiccup. After jumping into the air, the dynamic duo zipped through the air to their favorite fishing spot.

After a minute of flying, the two find themselves in the same peaceful and isolated cove Toothless had found himself trapped in over 5 years ago.

"Alright. Let's get fishing!" After shouting that out, Toothless gave his rider a strange look. "What?" Hiccup then face palmed when he realized he didn't bring anything to fish with. "Well, you can try catching a fish yourself. I'll just eat something when we get back.

"You want me to see if I can catch you anything?" a voice spoke to Hiccup.

"No thanks." He replied, leaning against a nearby tree. _"Wait a minute."_ Hiccup pushed himself away from the trunk and began to spin around, looking for anyone who was around. Toothless watched his friend in confusion. "Did you hear that, Toothless?" The Night Fury shook his head. "I heard someone nearby. At least, I thought I did." Hiccup took a look around a second time. "Must've been my imagination." The dragon rider sat down and leaned against a rock and watched as his dragon proceeded to catch a fish.

Well, attempted.

For about thirty minutes, Toothless splashed around in the small body water what seemed endlessly. Both Hiccup and Toothless ended up drenched and hungry. "I guess we'll just grab something to eat when we get back." Hiccup said, getting up from his spot.

Toothless shook the water off his scales. "You'd think I'd be able to catch at least one fish."

Hiccup froze. "Did you hear that voice?" He slowly turned around to look at Toothless. "D-did you just s-say something?"

"…Can you understand me?" the Night Fury spoke.

"Oh gods! I must be going crazy!" Hiccup began pulling at his hair.

"Uh...Hiccup?"

It had just hit Hiccup. It was never another Viking who shouted "Let's go!" It was Toothless.

"Hiccup!"

"What?!"

Toothless stepped back in alarm. "Sorry, Toothless. This is just…"

"I know." Hiccup flinched slightly at Toothless' voice.

"I guess it's not so bad. I'm able to know what you're saying."

"So…you're good? No more freaking out?"

"Yeah…"

"Alright. That's good…"

"Oh why is this happening to me!"

"_Saw that coming."_ Toothless thought.

"Do the gods really hate me that much?! Give me a break!"

"Hiccup, I know this'll probably sound weird coming out of me, but I'm sure everything will be alright. We can figure this out."

"Oh man! What about Astrid? When she finds out, she'll freak!"

"Okay, now you just need to calm down. Let's just head on back and pretend there's nothing wrong and that you don't understand me."

Hiccup took some deep breaths. "Okay..I'll try."

"Good. Now let's go get some food."

Hiccup hopped onto Toothless' back. "Yeah, I'm not hungry anymore."

"Well, I am, so… I'm still gonna eat." Toothless said before taking to the skies.

Once back at Berk, the two made their way to the Haddock residence to discuss how to hide Hiccup's little secret.

"I just gotta act natural." Hiccup said to Toothless. "I also can't reply to you when you growl..err..speak..oh, whatever you want to call it."

"I'll try not to talk to you too much." replied the Night Fury. "Just remember not to talk to me like you can understand my language, even though you can."

"I know. I'll try my best."

Toothless and Hiccup casually walked out from behind the house and back to the public, where they made their first encounter with a Berk's newest member, Dyina.

"Oh! Hi, Chief!" the young teen shouted as she approached.

"Hey! Dyina, right? You look different since the last time I saw you, in a good way, of course."

"Thanks!"

Dyina no longer had the look of a feral animal that she had when she first arrived at Berk. Dyina was now wearing a fitted, light green shirt with long sleeves, a short, black fur skirt with matching black leggings, a pair of dark brown fur boots, and a short, brown fur vest. Her hair was now untangled and pulled back in a single braid, with a few bangs hanging over her more- noticeable face. Dangling from her thin neck was the Terrible Terror's tooth she had on when she first arrived.

"Gobber had a box of some old clothes and fabric in his workshop, including a needle and some thread."

"Oh. That explains why that shirt looks like the same one I had worn when I was your age, well, besides the fact that now it's not as loose or long as it used to be." Dyina looked down at her new shirt after his comment. "Pretty good with a needle."

"My mother taught me how to sew." Dyina said. "It was something we did together sometimes." A sad expression grew on the girl's face as she began to play with the ends of her braid.

"Where are your parents?" Toothless grumbled, knowing she wasn't going answer him.

"My parents died when I was really young. I can't remember exactly how, but my guess is a dragon raid." Both Hiccup and Toothless were surprised that she actually answered as if she heard Toothless, but guessed it was just coincidence. Never the less, hearing what she said made both dragon and rider sad for her.

Hiccup spoke, "Wasn't there anyone else there to care for you?"

"I do have an Aunt and Uncle." Dyina replied. "They took care of me for years, but didn't want me after..after…"

"After what?" Hiccup asked.

"I…I can't tell you."

"Why not?"

"For years I've been going from island to island, trying to find a new place to call home after my Aunt and Uncle kicked me out, heck, kicked me off the island is more like it, but each place always ended up kicking me off as well. Sometimes it was just because I was foreign, other times it was because I..I tried to stop the Viking from killing the dragons when they raided the village."

"Is that why her Aunt and Uncle didn't want her anymore?" Toothless whispered to Hiccup.

"No, that's not the reason why they didn't want me anymore. It was because of a different reason."

That was more than just coincidence.

"Um, Dyina?" Hiccup said.

"What?"

"I didn't ask if that was the reason your Aunt and Uncle didn't want you anymore."

"..Y-you didn't?" Dyina's heart beat quickened.

"No." He would have added that Toothless had asked the question, but knew that would reveal that he could understand his dragon. Anyways, Hiccup could tell that she knew he had when her eyes fell upon the Night Fury.

"I-I have to go. G-Gobber p-probably needs my help." Dyina stuttered before sprinting off.

_"I think I know the reason why."_

After Hiccup and Toothless' weird encounter with Dyina, they decided to forget it for now and make their way through the village to find some food that they have yet to eat. Apparently, Hiccup wasn't the only one when he spotted his spouse with a fisherman who had in his possession a large and full barrel of fish.

"Hi, Astrid!" Hiccup yelled, accelerating his pace.

"Oh, hi, Hiccup!" Astrid shouted, waving to her husband. "How was working on Spitelout's house today?"

"Oh, it was pretty good." Hiccup answered, stopping when he was next to her. "We finished about an hour or so ago."

"Have you eaten yet?"

"Nope. Neither has Toothless."

"In that case," Astrid turned back to the fisherman. "can I get two, three salmon, please, and some cod for Toothless?"

"Of course, Astrid." The fisherman replied, pulling some fish from his barrel and placing them into a burlap sack.

"Thank you." She said, trading her small bag of coins for the large sack of fish.

The couple and Toothless walked together back to their house with empty stomachs and a bag full of fish.

"So, tell me about this new girl on Berk." Astrid said. "When did she get here?"

"She arrived this morning before sunrise." Hiccup replied. "Got here on an old boat on the other side of the island."

"Did you ask her where she's from, or if anybody was with her?"

"Nobody's with her, but I hadn't asked where she's from."

Whack!

"Ow! What was that for?" Hiccup said, rubbing the back of his head.

"What if she's from one of our enemy's tribes? She could be an Outcast or something!"

"She's not an Outcast. Well, she is an outcast but she's not an Outcast."

"…What?!"

"When she was younger, her Aunt and Uncle kicked her out to fend for herself. That's why she's all alone."

"Oh really? Did she say _why_ they kicked her out?"

"Well, no, but.."

"There could have been a very good reason why they did it, Hiccup!"

Toothless mumbled, "Could you guys, just, not fight."

"But I think I might know the reason why."

"I'm listening."

"Well, before I found you, she ran into me on my way to get us something to eat and a couple of times Toothless asked her a question. I know it would just sound like growls to other Vikings, but she answered him like she understood. I think the reason her Aunt and Uncle didn't want her is because she could…"

"Hold on. How did you know Toothless was asking questions?" Astrid interrupted.

"Uh… It was just a guess. I mean, after I told her I didn't ask, she got all nervous and I saw her look towards Toothless before she ran away."

"Nice try! I know how to tell when you're lying."

"Wow. I didn't even say anything and you blew it." Toothless said.

"Not helping." Hiccup answered.

"Oh. My. Gods! You can understand what he's saying!"

"Uh…"

"Get in the house!" Astrid yelled, pointing towards the front door. Hiccup hadn't even realized they had made it back home. "Go!"

Hiccup obeyed, mainly because he could feel the attention their argument had drawn. He just hoped none of them heard everything that was said, especially the part of him understanding Toothless.

Once inside, Astrid shut the door behind them. "Let me see your arm." Hiccup was about to ask why, but knew what her intentions were and removed his garments. When his skin could now be seen, a shocking discovery had been made. Now, not only were his healing wounds covered with small, black scales, but so was most of his arm and shoulder.

"It's trying to spread to the rest of your body! What do we do?!"

"I don't know." Hiccup said, staring at his arm. "I don't know why it's happening."

"It's probably from that strange, monstrous dragon that bit you." Toothless said.

"We already considered that, Toothless, but thanks." Hiccup said. He looked back at Astrid who was trying to look _less_ freaked out that her husband could understand dragons, but was easy to see in her eyes. "Sorry."

"What? Don't be. It's not like it's your fault." Astrid replied, putting on a fake smile.

"So, what are we gonna do, Astrid?" Hiccup asked, trying to get back on subject. "If it keeps spreading, I won't be able to hide it as well."

"Have you told your Mom yet?"

"Err…"

"Hiccup!" Astrid shouted. "She's your mother, the woman who rai…well, brought you into this world. She deserves to know."

"But if I tell her, she'll freak out."

"I know, but it's better you tell her yourself than her finding out another way. The sooner, the better."

As on cue, Valka made her way down the stairs where she could see the young couple.

"Mom… There's something I need to tell you."

Valka motioned her hand. "There's no need. I could hear you upstairs." She made it down to the bottom. She walked towards her son.

"I should have told you sooner, I know. I just…" Hiccup was stopped when his mother wrapped her arms over his shoulders.

"It's okay." She whispered in his ear. "Everything will be okay."


	10. Ch 10 Behind the Mask

**A.N- Hey, guys! Hope y'alls had a good weekend. I'm happy to finally be putting this chapter up. I thought I would had done it sooner but I didn't get the chapter done as soon as I wanted, mainly because of school. But here it is! I'm also pretty sure this is my longest chapter in my story so far, so I think that's pretty awesome. I started the 11th chapter today, so I hope to get that done soon, but I know it won't be forever until it's at least done. Thanks for making it up to the 10th chapter with me, btw. I hope you guys enjoy it. And remember to Stay Awesome!  
**

* * *

_Chapter 10_

_**Behind the Mask**_

"Hiccup! Hiccup? HICCUP!"

In alarm, Hiccup tumbled out of bed and hit the wooden floor with a thud. Toothless' roar was sure to have woken up the whole neighbor. The Night Fury walked to the other side to where his rider had fallen.

"Good Morning!" Toothless shouted.

"Toothless." Hiccup groaned. "Would you be quiet? You'll wake everyone up."

"Oh, please."

Moments later, a crescendo of footsteps approached his room, and with them, his mother appeared in the doorway. "What in the name of Odin was that?"

"Sorry, Mom. Toothless was trying to wake me up, and succeeded." Hiccup's green eyes rose up at Toothless, who still stood beside him.

"Well, then. I guess I'll make breakfast while I'm up. I hope you can join me."

"'_Me?'"_ Hiccup lifted himself up enough to look on the other side of his bed. Astrid wasn't there. "Where's Astrid?" he asked.

"She spent the night at her parents' house. She thought it might've been best to leave you alone for the night."

"She didn't have to do that. I'm fine."

Valka raised a brow. She didn't say another word, and left.

Toothless stayed to help Hiccup up, whose artificial leg was taken off last night for his convenience. "Thanks, Bud." He said to his companion.

"No problem. I'll grab your leg for you." Toothless turned to pick up the prosthetic off a nearby chair, slapping Hiccup with his tail in the process. Toothless dropped the man-made object into his lap.

"Thanks, Toothless." Hiccup said. He suddenly became disgusted as he felt the saliva on his leg left by the dragon.

Instead of an apology from the Nightfury, Toothless laughed. As a reward, Hiccup wiped the spit from the prosthetic onto the scales of the dragon before putting it on. Afterwards, he continued to strap on the rest of his gear.

"Y,know,Toothless," he said, "I'm beginning to like this."

"Like what?" he asked." The dragon spit?"

"Thor, no! I was talking about this. Being able to understand what you're saying."

"Oh, of course. I like it, too, besides the fact I can't say anything that I don't intend for you to hear anymore when you're around."

"Really? Like what?" Hiccup asked, his back towards Toothless.

"You think I'm dumb enough to tell you?"

"Nope. Just hoping you'd slip up." Hiccup turned back around. Toothless was astonished at what he saw.

"Hiccup? Have you looked at your reflection lately?"

Hiccup could tell that wasn't good news. Shuffling around the stuff in his room, Hiccup looked for anything that he could use to see himself. Under his bed he found a piece of scrap metal, its surface clear enough to use as a mirror. Hiccup shifted the shard in his hand until he was able to see clearly what Toothless was talking about. The scales from his wound had spread to the bottom of his chin. He pulled down the collar of his shirt enough to see the left side of his neck was completely covered in scales.

"Oh, great. Just great! What am I gonna do?! I can't go out there like this. People will ask questions."

"Why don't you try that Healing Gel?" Toothless suggested.

Hiccup grabbed the jar off his side table and unscrewed the lid of the container. Scooping some out with his hand, he began smearing the slime over the scaly area. "I knew I felt something on my chin this morning. I just thought it was my beard starting to grow out." He said as he applied the substance to his face. Hiccup gagged at the overwhelming stench that entered his nose.

"Hiccup! Are you coming down today?!" his mother shouted from the kitchen.

"I'll be down soon!" Hiccup yelled towards the door. He turned back to Toothless. "What am I going to do?" he asked. "Even if this stuff does solve my problem, it'll take some time until it takes full affect."

"Hmm.. I think I have an idea."

Valka could hear uneven footsteps coming down the stairs, who she knew belonged to her son. Behind she could also hear the heavy footsteps of his Night Fury. "Glad you could come down for breakfast, son." She said. Her eyes strained away from her pan and onto Hiccup, who was wearing his helmet. "Why do you have mask on in the house? You don't need it to eat breakfast."

"Well..I..uh…" He didn't think of anything if someone were to ask him what his mother was.

"Come on. Take it off. You can wear it when you're out flying." She said, scraping bits of fish onto their plates.

"But,but.."

"No 'buts,' Hiccup. It's time to eat. Hard to run a village on an empty stomach."

Hiccup sighed. He slowly began lifting the helmet up from his head, trying to hide the scales from his mother's view. When the mask no longer covered his chin, a horrid stench spread across the room, causing Valka's face to shift into an expression of disgust. "What in Odin's name is that smell?"

An idea hit Hiccup. "Well, when Toothless woke me up this morning, I fell off the bed and scratched my chin against a splinter in the floor. Don't worry, though. I put some of Gobber's Healing Gel on it."

"Is that what that is?" Valka asked, gripping her nose.

Hiccup nodded. "That's why I'm wearing the mask." He smiled when he said that, proud that he could come up with an excuse to keep the mask on.

"Well, as much as I hate the stench, I still want you to eat your fish, so take it off for now."

Hiccup's smile vanished. He took off his helmet once again and kept the scales away from his mother's view. He didn't look up from his plate.

Hiccup was surprised. This food actually had..flavor. Valka's cooking lessons from Astrid's mother were paying off. It would've tasted better if it weren't for the distacting smell of the gel on his chin.

Hiccup ate breakfast quickly. He was in a rush to get his riding helmet back on over his face, where nobody would see the black scales. Once the last bit went into his mouth, he rushed over to his mask, immediately shoved it on, and bolted for the door.

"Hiccup!" Valka shouted. Hiccup paused with his hand on the door handle. "You know, if there's something wrong, I just want you to know you can tell me anything."

"I know." Hiccup said, letting his hand fall to his side. "Is there a reason you're telling me this?"

"Yes, Hiccup. There is." Valka stood up from her chair. "You've been acting weird this morning. Wearing the mask, not looking up once from your breakfast…

"Which was good, by the way. I really should be goi.."

"And the rushing to get out of here. What's so important that you don't have time sit down and have a relaxing breakfast?"

"Nothing, nothing. I just..need to…get out of the house and get things done around here, you know?"

"But you do that every day, son."

"Yeah, but ever since the dragon incident, I feel like I haven't been.. giving it my fullest. You get what I'm saying?"

"Well, I guess s.."

"Glad you understand. I'll see you later!" Like that, Hiccup was out of the house. He knew it was rude, but he didn't want to somehow end up having to tell his mom the truth. She might freak out. Heck, he was freaked out. But it didn't matter now. It turns out his little lie was also true.

Hiccup promised Gobber this week that he'd help out at the workshop at least once, and he told him he'd do it today. Before entering, he checked to make sure nobody was around. When he was sure no one was, he lifted his mask to wipe the terrible smelling gel off his chin. He pulled the helmet back down and walked in.

"Ah! Mornin' Hiccup!" Gobber shouted across the shop.

After hearing his name, Dyina's head shot up from her workstation and turned to see the chief standing in the entrance. Hiccup had almost forgotten she was working with Gobber. He was the one who introduced her in the first place. This time, unlike the other times they've run into each other, Dyina didn't seem too cheerful to see him. He guessed it had to do with their conversation yesterday.

"Good morning, Gobber. Any…"

"Say, why are you wearing that? You're not planning to skip out and take a joy ride on Toothless, are ya?"

"What? No, no. I just.. have this cut on my chin. It's pretty ugly."

"You put some of that Healing Gel on it?"

"Why, yes I did." _Before I wiped it off._

"Well, okie dokie, then. Ya want me to take a look at it?"

Hiccup stepped back when Gobber began walking up to him with his hand reaching for his mask. "No, it's fine." He said quickly, putting his hand up in defense. "I was, uh, actually going to go to Eira's later."

"Oh. Alright, then. Let's get to work."

Aside from the racket of the work place and constant chatter of customers outside, there hung an awkward silence between Hiccup and Dyina. Hiccup would sometimes come over to start a conversation, but every time he came closer to where she worked, she'd tense up, and he saw it, and backed away. Gobber also noticed the tension between the two.

"Ev'rything alright between you two? You're acting like strangers to each other."

"Everything's fine, Gobber," Dyina said.

"Oh, don't lie ta me, Dyina. I know something's up."

Neither of them said anything.

Gobber huffed, "Every time I've seen you two together, you're always talking. And you, Dyina," Gobber pointed at her with his prosthetic hammer, "you always seem so excited to see Hiccup, until now."

"There's nothing going on, Gobber," Hiccup spoke. "Like what Dyina said, everything's fine."

"Everything's NOT fine!" Gobber exclaimed. "I don't know what it is that's making ya act like this, but I want it resolved!" Gobber stomped away to greet the next Viking in line, faking a smile as he approached.

Hiccup knew Gobber was right. He wanted it to be all right between him and Dyina again. He took the first step and walked over to her again, ignoring the tenseness in her body.

"Gobber's right, Dyina," Hiccup said. "We need to make it fix this."

Dyina looked up at him. She knew he was right. She just didn't want to talk about what happened. Hiccup sat down next to her. He wasn't sure how to start this conversation, but he knew he should start. But before he could, Dyina had already spoken.

"I know what you want to talk about," she said. "About what happened yesterday, right?"

"Yes," Hiccup replied.

"Then you probably know, right? That I can…"

"…talk to dragons?"

Dyina peeled her eyes off the table and looked at Hiccup's eyes. Hiccup could see the fear rising in her gaze. He knew why she was scared, but needed to reassure that she had no reason to.

"Hiccup, I-I…"

"Hey, you have no reason to be worried. It's not like I'm gonna banish you from Berk."

Dyina sighed on relief. "You don't mind?"

"Are you kidding? This is island that keeps dragons as pets. You could be the island's dragon whisperer or something. Why would you be afraid of others knowing?"

"Because it's part of the reason no one else wanted me."

Hiccup's small smile faded. Even he and Toothless both thought this was the reason her aunt and uncle no longer wanted her around. He never thought of this being the reason she could never find a permanent home.

"I'm sorry."

"It's fine. Now I'm here, and you pretty much said I don't have to go anywhere, so it's alright now."

"You said that was part of the reason. What's the other part?"

"Trying to stop others from killing the dragons."

"Oh yeah. You told me about that already. Luckily for you, dragon raids are over for Berk."

Hiccup pushed his chair back and stood up, stretching his arms as he did. He suddenly felt an itch spread across his chin. Without thinking, he squeezed his hand under his helmet, pushing part of it up revealing a patch of black scales that he was hiding. Unfortunately for Hiccup, Dyina's eyes were still focused on him.

"Holy Odin's ghost! What are those?!" she asked.

"What?! Nothing!" Hiccup pulled his hand out from underneath his mask, causing it to go back down. "What are you talking about?"

"You had something all over your chin. Almost like scales."

"Nothing! I-I better get back to work before Gobber comes back." Hiccup walked quickly back to his station.

"Hiccup!" Dyina yelled for him. "Y'know, this just creates more tension between us! We'll have to fix this, too!"

For most of the work time, Hiccup tried to avoid Dyina's glare, but tried not to be as distant as they were when they first started. The workshop seemed very busy that day. It didn't help that they fires made by Gobber's hotburple, Grump made the small space steaming hot. Luckily for them, the wave of customers had calmed down to only a few with small requests. After they were satisfied and went back to their day, the workers finally could rest. Gobber hobbled in over to his spinning rack of interchangeable hands.

"Alright you two," he said, screwing off his hammer hand. "You've had a good, hard days work and seemed to have fixed some of your little problem up, so as a gift, I'm givin' y'all the rest of the day off."

"Wow!" Exclaimed Dyina. "Thanks, Gobber."

"Eh don't mention it. Just have fun with your free time." Gobber began screwing on his interchangeable "hand." "I have stuff to get done around here, anyway."

"You want any help, Gobber?" Hiccup volunteered.

"Nah, I can do it myself. But thanks, though. I'll see ya later."

Gobber stepped into another part of the workshop.

"So, Dyina, what are you up to?" Hiccup asked.

"I'm not really sure. Perhaps I can… oh nevermind."

"What? C'mon, you can tell me."

"No, You've helped me so much, already. I don't want to intervene."

"Hey, part of being chief is to help out as much as possible. Just tell me what you need."

"No, no. It's fine."

"Dyina, talk to me," Hiccup paused, "please."

Dyina sighed. She then led Hiccup to a corner of the workshop. On the ground, Hiccup found a couple of worn out sheets and a pillow that's obviously seen better days.

"You've been sleeping here?"

"Well, yeah. But I think I know somewhere I can crash. I just need to repair the place. That's all."

"What place?"

"It's this house I found in the woods. It's small, but it's good enough for me."

"I didn't even know there was a house in the woods."

"Well, it looks like it's been vacant for a really long time, but I think I can fix up."

"Well, maybe I can take a look at it. See exactly what it needs."

Dyina shrugged. "I guess I could you another pair of eyes."

Dyina led Hiccup through the forest. They meandered back and forth, left and right, almost spinning him in circles. Hiccup recognized the cove Toothless had been trapped in before Hiccup made him the tail fin, but nothing else seemed familiar.

"_I'm gonna have to follow her back to Berk," _he thought.

After what seemed like forever, Dyina finally stopped at a rundown home.

The house looked to be only two rooms from the outside, but Hiccup wouldn't dare go in. The roof had already caved in, and the walls looked so fragile, he was surprised the wind hadn't knocked the rest of it over. Vines and moss covered almost every inch of the property, and there was a small stench like something had died in there. It looked as if a dragon had burned the place down.

"I know what you're thinking, but I think with a lot of effort, this place could be a home again. I can just see it. One of the rooms can be a bedroom; the other can be a kitchen. It's all I need."

Hiccup thought long about it. He was quiet for awhile. Dyina thought he would put the idea down. She continued waiting for his response; she was surprise by what he said.

"Well, it'll take a lot of effort to get this place back up, but I'm sure we can get it fixed. I'm sure there've been worse houses needed fixing back when dragons would blow them up."

Dyina smiled. She grasped Hiccup in a tight hug. Hiccup returned it happily.

"Now, if you don't mind, could you show me the way back to Berk?"

Dyina led him back the way they came. It would take some time for Hiccup to learn the way on his own. Hiccup became relieved to hear the voices of Vikings nearby. He felt even better when he could see some houses in front of them.

"Well," he said, "If you ever need a place to stay until that house is back up, I'm sure we can find a place for you to sleep up at my place."

"Nah! I'll just stay at the workshop. I really don't mind."

"If you say so. But do come by my house before you go to sleep. I at least want to give you some blankets and a pillow that are in good condition."

"Alright. I'll try to remember. I'll see you later, Hiccup, and I will find out what's wrong with your face."

"Alright, I'll see ya."

Dyina began to run off towards the center of the village. Before she could make it out of earshot, Hiccup called for her with an idea in his mind.

"Hey, Dyina!" he shouted.

Dyina turned around. "What?!"

Hiccup motioned her over. She made her way back. When she was close enough where Hiccup didn't have to yell, Hiccup continued to speak.

"If you want, maybe we could find you your own dragon."

"What?" she said.

"Well, I'm pretty sure you don't have one. Why don't we try finding one that suits you? Here."

Hiccup took out the old Dragon manual from his vest and handed over to her.

"This was written before Vikings and dragons were allies, but it still gives you some information about them. Maybe it'll help you narrow down what dragon you want. Just tell me when you're ready to find your dragon."

"Woah. Thanks, Hiccup," she replied.

She flipped through the pages of the book, skimming over what dragons were in it. She stopped on a particular page, but Hiccup couldn't see what it was, but she seemed interested in what was on it.

"Is it ok if I write in this at all?" she asked.

"I guess that would be ok. We need a new book, anyway."

"Great. Thanks. See you later, Hiccup."

Dyina began walking back the direction she had been running earlier, jotting something down in the manual. Hiccup was a little taken aback. He was sure Dyina would have been more excited. Perhaps it was another thing he had to learn about her. He only knew part of her past, not her whole life.

As Hiccup began walking back to the house, he felt a sudden sting on his side. It was alarming. He hadn't felt any pain since the incident. This must have been a sign that it was getting worse. Earlier he had felt something similar in his eye, but just took it as the wind stinging it.

He made his way behind one of his neighbor's houses, where nobody could see him. He struggled to pull his shirt up, and saw that most of his upper left side had scales all over. He was even convinced he saw some in the process of forming. Seeing that there was a barrel full of clear water next to him, he took off his mask and looked at his reflection. Almost his entire half of his face was now covered in the tiny scales. But it wasn't that that frightened him the most. His eye was no longer human, but now looked like the eye of a Night Fury. The eye color was still his, but now his whole eye was forest green with a black slit.

It was perfectly clear now what was happening to him. It frightened Hiccup. He wasn't sure if he should tell Astrid, but she'd find out on her own, anyway. It was probably better that he told her himself.

When he got back home, he found Stormfly playing around with Toothless, meaning Astrid was home. He approached the door, but didn't enter when he heard Toothless call out to him.

"Hey, Hiccup!" Toothless shouted. "Glad to see you're home. Can we go flying?"

"Hiya, Hiccup!" He heard someone else shout. From behind Toothless stumbled Stormfly, who he guessed was the other voice talking to him. "I'm gonna guess Toothless wasn't lying when he told me you could talk to dragons."

"Oh, it's not just him. Dyina can talk to dragons, too."

"Oh, I knew that. I've chatted with her befo…"

"Woah! Hold on! Toothless, you told her?" Hiccup motioned his hand at the Deadly Nadder.

"Why? Was I not supposed to do that?"

"No! I don't want everyone's dragons coming over to talk to me! Everyone will see that something's up and I'll slip. It's kinda hard already to avoid talking to you."

"Oh. Sorry."

"Don't worry, Hiccup," said Stormfly, "Your secret's safe with me."

"I guess that means I should probably tell the others not to spread the word." Toothless mumbled.

"Others?! Who else did you tell?"

"Oh, not too many other dragons. Just Hookfang, Meatlug, Barf and Belch, and Barf and Belch are the same dragon."

"Good luck telling those two to keep quiet," growled Stormfly, "Barf and Belch can never keep a secret, especially Barf."

Toothless could see the anger boiling in Hiccup's mix-matched eyes.

"What's wrong with your eye?" Toothless asked.

Hiccup didn't answer. Toothless looked away.

"I'll just.. go tell the others…"

"You're not going anywhere, Toothless," Hiccup said, "At least, not yet. Wait here."

Toothless obeyed.

Hiccup gulped, but then opened the door. Hiccup squeezed his "dragon eye" shut. Astrid and Valka had already started dinner without him. Both looked up from their meals to greet him.

"Glad you could make it, son," said Valka, "we weren't sure how long you'd be, and Astrid and I were hungry. I hope you don't mind."

"No, it's fine, Mom."

"Is there something wrong with your eye?"

"What? No, I think I just got some dust in it.

"Want me to take a look?"

"No, I'm alright."

Astrid began to speak, "While you were gone, Dyina came by. She said you were going to give her some blankets and pillows that she could use when she went to bed. But don't worry. I gave some to her. I said she could stay here, but she refused."

"Yeah, I already tried."

"Oh."

"Well don't just stand there, Hiccup," Valka said. "Sit down and join us. I already put some fish on your plate."

But Hiccup didn't join them. He just stood there, hoping Astrid would look back up from her dinner. Astrid took a sip from her water. She knew something was up when Hiccup didn't budge. Seeing that he got Astrid's attention, his open eye switched back and forth between her and his mother, signaling that he didn't want his mother involved.

Astrid mouthed, "Are you okay?"

Hiccup shook his head, and then tipped it towards the door. Astrid understood, and stood up from her seat.

"Sorry, Valka. There's something me and Hiccup need to discuss."

"Oh. Did you want to talk about with me?"

"I'd rather just discuss it with Astrid, alone."

"Did you want me to leave?"

"No, no. We'll just discuss it outside. We'll be back soon."

"Well, okay, I guess."

The couple walked outside. Part of Valka wanted to believe this was just a husband-wife problem that they wanted to fix, but most of her was in doubt.

Before Astrid asked, Hiccup just said, "I don't want to do it here. Get on Stormfly."

Astrid did as she was told, and mounted her dragon, as did Hiccup. Together, they flew down into the cove in the woods, where nobody would be there to listen.

"Can you tell me what's going on, Hiccup?" Astrid asked, hopping off the Nadder.

Hiccup didn't answer. Right after he got off Toothless, he gathered some sticks into a small pile, and then ordered his Night Fury to create a fire, which brightened the area, more so with the light bouncing of the pond's surface. Before he said anything, he felt another sting on his side.

"Hiccup?" Astrid's voice wavered.

"The scales have spread to my side," He said. "And that's not just it."

Hiccup took off his helmet and threw it onto the ground. He opened his eye, showing Astrid the full effect on his face.

Astrid gasped. "Oh, Hiccup!" she whispered.

"I've been wearing my mask all day to cover this." Hiccup pointed to the scales around his chin. "It's spreading faster."

Astrid panicked. "Well, maybe Eira can fix this. We can fix this. You're gonna be okay. You have to be okay, we'll…"

Hiccup grabbed her hand and dragged her over to hold her in his arms. He felt her hear beat slow down. Her rapid breathing slowed with it.

"I think it's time that we faced the facts, Astrid. I'm pretty sure we both know what's happening to me."

"What are you saying Hiccup?" she knew what he was talking about, but needed to hear it from him.

Hiccup didn't want to say it, either, but he did anyway. "I-I'm turning into a Night Fury."

Toothless' jaw dropped. He had dreams about this before. He'd thought he would be excited to have Hiccup as a fellow Night Fury to hang around with, but now that it was real, he didn't like it. He wanted Hiccup to stay the way he was. That's the way he liked him, and that's the way he wanted him to stay.

"I'm gonna be okay, Astrid. I have to, right?"

"Yeah," she said, "We'll get through this, together."


	11. Ch11 Kidnapped

**A.N- I'm still alive! Really, really sorry it took me awhile to update this! I thought I would do this soon after I uploaded the last chapter, then that turned into a month later, and now that was about 3 months ago. I would've gotten this done sooner, but I guess I got a little busier with school and clubs and sometimes felt like drawing or something other than photography. I guess I should also say that on October 4th I became an Aunt! My sister gave birth to a beautiful and super adorable baby girl! Her name is Autumn Lily and I just love her to death! I actually was contemplating whether or not to add some things to this chapter or just start it on the next. I decided to just add it to the next since a) this has a pretty good amount of words compared to my other chapters, and b) I think you've guys waited long enough. Alright, I'm gonna let you guys read this. Hopefully the next chapter won't take three months to update, but I can't promise anything, especially since apparently at Live Oaks, the 3rd quarter is suppose to be the most stressful (yay :/). I hope you enjoy chapter 11! If you see any typos, btw, please feel free to tell me. One day I was kinda skimming through some chapters around the beginning and saw some things that needed revision, which I did fix some but I want to get a more thorough search before I update the fixed chapters. Anyways, Stay Awesome!  
**

* * *

_Chapter 11_

_**Kidnapped**_

The evening was growing cold, and the spritzing waters were no aid to warmth.

"Hey, Avis!" shouted one of the sails men, "When are we gonna get there? We're cold, hungry, and haven't slept in days!"

"Calm yourself, Mitch!" Avis yelled, "We'll be there by tomorrow, as long as we keep a straight course!"

"You said that yesterday!" argued Ug.

"Well, we would've been, if someone hadn't fallen asleep at the wheel and turn us in the wrong direction!"

All the Vikings turned to look at Hoark, who was sitting on top of a barrel, sound asleep.

"I wouldn't mind being him right now," mumbled Ug.

Avis looked around at his crew. Each of them had bags drooping under their eyes and were all very slow. Some of the men could barely keep their eyes open for three seconds. Avis himself was struggling to stay on his feet.

Avis sighed. "Alright. I'll let you rest. I'll be on the first watch. But if I spot one dragon, nap time's over. Get some rest, men."

"Thanks, Avis."

"Finally, I can get some shut eye."

"Hopefully there aren't any dragons out tonight."

While all the men gathered below deck, except Hoark, Avis took a seat on a nearby crate and watched the skies, using all his strength to stay awake.

Down from below, a scrawny figure climbed up to the top and walked over to Avis, wide and awake.

"Hey, Avis?" asked Brant.

Avis, who had been falling asleep, shot his eyes partially open and looked up at the boy standing over him.

"What is it, Toothpick?" he replied groggily.

"Well, you haven't slept for days, like all the other men, so I thought I'd take first shift for you. That way, you can get some sleep and be more awake afterwards."

"Thank you, Brant," Avis said, "but I'm fine. You go get some rest. I'll be down at the second shift."

"Come on, Avis. You can barely stay awake. I've gotten some sleep today while I was below deck; so I'm wide awake. You can trust me."

Avis thought about it, and made up his mind.

"You're right. I can't even keep my focus on you. But if a dragon comes, wake me up. Got it?"

Brant nodded.

Avis slowly got up and walked towards Brant. Brant began to walk around Avis to go to where he had been sitting, but was pulled back by his shirt. Brant turned towards Avis, who was pointing towards the pillar he measured him on. Brant sighed, but walked over. While Brant stood straight against the pole, Avis brought his knife out of his pouch and brought it near his head. Avis forced himself to stay awake as he nicked the wood, making sure he didn't do so to the teen's head. Brant backed away from the pole so Avis could compare the height of the marks.

"Looks like you lost two more inches," Avis yawned.

Brant looked at the slashes across the pillar to make sure Avis' calculations were accurate. He grumbled when he saw they were true.

"You're not gonna tell Drago, are you?" Brant asked.

Avis sighed, "I know I'm suppose to report this to him, but I'll tell you what, if you don't lose another inch, maybe two, I won't tell him. 'Kay?"

"Okay."

"Alright, Toothpick. I'll see ya when I wake up."

"Night, Avis."

Brant picked up a nearby spear and held it as he watched the stars. He kept asking in his mind to the gods why they were doing this; what they had against him. Nobody seemed to answer.

While no one was watching, Brant pulled his pant leg up to where he could see where the bite mark would have been if it weren't for the Terrible Terror scales in his way. It looked as if he had a green rash spreading over the skin of his leg. He had no idea what it meant, but it frightened him. He wasn't sure if he should have been more worried about his condition or the fact that Drago would definitely be putting him in one of the dragon cages. He hoped Avis wouldn't ask about his leg or mention anything about scales on it. If he did ask, he'd tell him the truth. If not, he wouldn't say a word.

Hiccup woke up early the next morning with a pain that undoubtedly was being caused by his unwanted transformation. The growth of his scales continued to grow more rapidly. He could predict that he had only a couple days left until his change was complete, or if the growth of the scales continued to accelerate, he may only have hours. Once every shred of skin was covered by the black scales, his body would change form, and he would be a dragon.

Dust particles flew off the ceiling, putting Hiccup into a coughing fit. He was coughing so hard, he managed to wake his wife.

"You okay, Hiccup?" Astrid asked, rubbing her eyes.

Hiccup coughed, "Yeah," he coughed again. "Just some dust."

There was a big BOOM at the top of the roof, sprinkling more dust over the couple, putting Hiccup back into a fit, and this time included Astrid in the fun.

"Toothless," both mumbled.

While Astrid went back to bed for a couple more hours, Hiccup got up to see what his pal wanted. Stepping outside, Hiccup turned to look up at the rooftop, with his Night Fury pounding at the tiles.

"Toothless!" he shouted, trying to get the dragon's attention.

Toothless stopped and looked down to see his rider, showing an expression of pleasure. Toothless hopped down to meet Hiccup at his feet, well, foot.

"Good morning, Hiccup! I hope you slept well."

"Luckily for you, the pain in my side woke me up before you did."

"From the scales?"

"Mhmm."

"Can I look at them? I wanted to see how much they'd spread since last night."

"No. No, no, no."

Hiccup backed away as Toothless came closer, forcing him against the side of the house. Hiccup pushed the curious dragon's snout.

"Ok, first of all, I'm not just gonna pull up my shirt and show you in public! And second…"

"Woah, woah, woah," Toothless interrupted, "You still want to keep this a secret?"

"Yes! Why would you ask that?"

"Well, I just thought..since.."

"Since what?"

"Well, you aren't hiding your face, this morning."

Hiccup's eyes widened. He slammed his hands against his face. The right side was soft, with a bit of stubbiness below his chin. On the left, he felt the smooth coating and bumpiness of the scales attached to his cheek.

Hiccup threw the front door opening, sprinting into the house. Toothless could hear as Hiccup rushed up the steps and into his bedroom. He could tell he was trying to be quiet around Astrid. His footsteps became less frequent and lighter on the floorboards. Seconds later, the same rushed footsteps stomped down the stairs and the door swung open to reveal Hiccup, this time with his mask on.

"That's better." Toothless said.

"Luckily no one else is up at this time," Hiccup replied. "So, what did you want?"

"To fly."

"... That's it? That's all you wanted."

"Uh..yeah?"

"Well, okay, I guess? But couldn't you have waited until later? Your stomping on the roof made me have a coughing fit, which woke up Astrid."

"How did my stomping give you a coughing fit?"

"You made the dust on the ceiling fall, which floated around the bed. That's how."

"Oh, I'm so terribly sorry," Toothless growled sarcastically, "Now can we go flying?"

"Oh. Hey guys!"

Toothless and Hiccup turned their attention towards Dyina, who was running up to them with a book in her hands.

"Hey, Dyina!" exclaimed Hiccup. "What are you doing up so early?"

"My body decided to wake me up about an hour ago and I couldn't get back to sleep. I decided to read more of the Dragon Manual you gave me, while taking some more notes." Dyina raised the book in her hands to show him the faded cover of the manual.

"Hey, that's great! Have you decided on a dragon yet?"

"Um, not really. It's a really hard decision. That and I'm not sure if I'm ready for a dragon.."

Hiccup couldn't hear the last part of what she said. It was mumbled under her breath.

"Sorry, what was that last part?"

Dyina sighed, "I don't think I'm ready for my own dragon."

"What? But you seem to really like dragons. You were really excited when you saw Toothless. I could also tell you loved it when you flew on his back."

"I do. I have nothing against dragons, well, besides the fact my parents were killed in a raid, it's just…" Dyina walked over next to Toothless.

"Just what?" asked Toothless.

"Just complicated."

Hiccup felt bad for Dyina. She lost both her parents at a young age. Not only that, the only family she had left rejected her and was forced to fend for herself.

"But of course I still like hanging with dragons like Toothless."

Dyina began scratching under Toothless' chin, who accepted happily.

"Well, how about you think about a little longer. A dragon will become your best friend instantly. I think you would be a great owner."

"Thanks, Hiccup."

Dyina stopped scratching the Night Fury and walked over to Hiccup, the Dragon Manual extended from her hand.

"Here."

"No. You keep it until you're positive about this."

"Actually, I was hoping you could look over some thing's I wrote. You don't have to."

"Oh, yeah. Yeah, I can look through some of it. I'll make sure to return it to you when I'm done with it."

"Great." Dyina put her arms around his shoulders. "Thanks again, Hiccup."

"Anything for a friend."

Dyina gave him a squeeze before releasing her grip. She looked up at his hooded face, noticing something weird about his eye.

"Woah! What's with your eye?"

Hiccup shut his left eye and covered it with his hand.

"What? I don't know what you're talking about."

"Has it always been that way?"

"Well, no. But it's nothing, really."

Dyina raised an eyebrow. "Okay, then? Can I ask about your hand?"

"My hand?" Hiccup took his hand down and saw that his fingernails had turned pitch black, with scales spreading out from under his sleeve.

Hiccup gasped. His left eye shot wide open, along with his normal one. He quickly snapped his left eye shut again and hid his hand behind his back.

Hiccup tried to play it cool; "There's nothing wrong with it. Just some soot, that's all."

"Are you sure?" she questioned.

"Absolutely. Now run along."

"Uh..alright. I'll just go now, I guess."

Dyina slowly turned away and walked in the opposite direction of the house. She knew something was wrong with him, but didn't want to force him to talk. He didn't push her, so she wouldn't push him, even if she could help in any way.

"Bye, Dyina!" roared Toothless.

_"No! I can't tell them my secret! I can't! I can't! I just can't!"_ Dyina thought.

After Dyina was out of sight, Hiccup pulled his hand back out in front of him to examine it. Taking a longer look, his nails seemed longer than they were before and were as thick and hard as Toothless'.

"Oh, great," Hiccup said. He pulled his shirtsleeve to where it hid most of the scales that were growing from around his wrist.

"So, gloves?" Toothless grumbled.

Hiccup sighed. "I'll deal with this later. Now, I just feel like flying with my Bud."

"'Bout time!"

The Night Fury jumped and wriggled with excitement, making it a slight task to get onto his saddle.

"Easy, Toothless!" Hiccup had to keep tell him.

Once he was sitting on top of the Night Fury, he put his foot in place and prepared himself for Toothless' takeoff. Once they were in the air, it felt as if all of Hiccup's worries had blown off into the wind.

The trapper's boat sailed closer and closer to the island, passing between the two stone Vikings; one who still needed repairs from their last battle. Avis stomped up the stairs to the deck, smirking when he saw Brant still sitting in his position with his head leaning against the stick of the spear. When Avis walked around to see the front of his face, a sliver of saliva dripped from his mouth into a puddle that had formed overnight.

"Wake up, Toothpick!" Avis shouted in his ear.

Brant jumped, falling off the crate and dropping the spear. The teen moaned from the abrupt awaking and stood up.

"What? Morning already?" Brant squinted his eyes at the light.

"Mhmm. I'm guessing you were on guard all night. No dragons last night?"

Brant yawn, "No, sir. Just the stars."

Avis and Brant could hear the heavy footsteps of one of the other men, presumably Mitch.

"Ick!" he exclaimed, wiping something wet off his face. "Who was drooling up here?"

Brant looked in the corner of his eye where he had been keeping watch. He felt embarrassed when he saw a puddle of spit draining through a crack in the wood, and then quickly wiped away the drool on his chin to hide the evidence.

One by one, the sailors awoke and climbed up the stairs, ready to start the day's wor.

"Hey, Brant," Avis pulled the scrawny Viking aside, "How's your leg?"

"M-my leg?"

"Yeah. Is that scale gone?"

"Um…" He didn't want to tell him, but he would have to. Brant didn't want to lose the trust he grew on Avis. He was saved when something else grabbed Avis' attention.

"Oi! Look at that!" Everyone turned to see what the leader was looking at. "I see we've made it to Berk!"

The crew cheered. Almost all were overjoyed to have finally made it to the island. Brant was surprised to see Avis the least happy of all of them.

"You okay, Avis?"

Avis shrugged, but his mood was lifted when his eye caught something else.

"You see that, Toothpick?" Avis said with a devious smile. He wrapped his arm around Brant's neck and pointed to something in the sky. "That there's a Night Fury. I only know the existence of one, and he needs a rider in order to fly."

"Are you saying that…?"

"That's the Dragon Master."

"Woohoo!" shouted Hiccup. "This is amazing!"

"You say that every time!" Toothless said.

"Because it's like this every time! This'll never get old!"

Toothless spun straight up through the top of the clouds before letting himself fall backwards and make a bunch of loops and swirls through the neighboring clouds. Suddenly, the dragon and rider began to plummet face first towards the active sea. The speed. The wind. The adrenaline. This is what both of them loved most about flying, with the exception of being with their best friend. Just before hitting the surface, Toothless lifted himself back up and began shooting towards the sky.

Once Toothless was level and at an appropriate speed, Hiccup threw his fists in the air, with a loud "Woo!" Toothless winced at the screech so close to his ear. "Man, I love this!"

"Soon, you'll be able to do it yourself."

"What are..Oh. Right…" He looked down at his partially black hand. Hiccup was so intrigued by their flight that he had almost forgotten that in a matter of days or even hours, he himself would be a Night Fury.

"Let's not worry about that right now," Hiccup said, "Let's do one more flight before going back home. Okay?"

Toothless' speed began to accelerate once more, lifting himself into the clouds, then back down again. He got faster and faster, but before he could let out a plasma blast somewhere in the vacant sky, an unknown object whizzed past his head. Toothless began to slow down.

"What was that?" he asked Hiccup.

"I don't know." Hiccup replied, looking back to see where the object went.

Hiccup turned himself back around, but ducked seconds before he could be entangled in the net that seemed to come out of nowhere. There was a faint shouting coming from the ocean below them. Looking down, he could see a single but large boat. By the equipment aboard it, he could assume one thing.

"Trappers."

Suddenly, more nets came shooting up at them, each one dodged by Toothless. Toothless was becoming infuriated.

"That's it! Let's see how well they can swim!"

"No, Toothless!" The Night Fury looked at Hiccup in confusion. "We need to warn the island." Once he saw Toothless' understanding, he then shouted, "Let's go!"

The first house Hiccup wanted to get to was home, where Astrid was still asleep. There, he could have Astrid help from the others to warn the island of the possible attack. However, dodging the enemy's nets was slowing down time to get there.

The two were almost over the island. Soon, they'd be out of danger from the nets where they could continue with their plan.

"We can do it, Toothless! We're almost there!"

Suddenly, Hiccup felt pain in his side, worse than usual. Wincing at the pain, Hiccup was too late to a nets spiraling towards him, and had no time to dodge it completely. Trying to miss getting hit, the net wrapped around Hiccup's left arm. The weights on the ends caused Hiccup to lose his balance and fell off of Toothless. He forgot to hook his vest to the saddle. Hiccup began to scream. His stomach felt like it was in his throat. He could hear the flapping of wings above him. Toothless was falling, too.

Hiccup managed to get the net off his arm and reached out for Toothless. Toothless used his wings to push himself towards his rider. Hiccup could almost grab the strap around Toothless' neck. But just before his fingers could even touch, the two were separated again. Toothless had flown close enough over the island to where he had fallen right on the edge of Berk. Hiccup, however, continued to fall towards the icy sea.

Toothless, surprised by the impact, shook off the shock and peered over the edge where Hiccup would soon hit the water. He watched as Hiccup's green eyes disappeared under the blue surface. Toothless was eager to jump in to retrieve his best friend, but kept stopping himself, knowing that if he went in, they'd both be stuck. The other half of his mind wanted to go get help, but he didn't want to leave Hiccup. Some relief came to him when Hiccup emerged out from underneath the water, but still wanted to get him out in fear he would get hyperthermia.

Hiccup breathed heavily and caught his breath. He could see Toothless above, anticipating to jump. He was going to tell him to stay put, but was caught by surprise when a hand grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and lifted him up out of the sea. He was then met eye to eye with a tall, muscular Viking, with greasy, brown hair. In the corner of his eye, Hiccup could see this man had a dragon tattoo on the arm the held him up, long with a sword that pierced through its heart. Hiccup could hear Toothless whimpering as the Viking set Hiccup down on the deck of the ship.

"Well, well, well. Look what we've got here, boys!" The man shouted, "We've got ourselves a dragon rider. But not just any dragon rider…" He grabbed Hiccup by the hairs on the back of his head and glared into his open eye. "We've got the so called 'Dragon Master!'"

The crew began to laugh. Some were clapping.

"We could go and capture his Night Fury,.."

The men began to prepare themselves.

"But, honestly, it's probably not the best idea to unite the 'Dragon Master' with his dragon, don't you think?"

The men stopped, a little confused.

"Yeah, sure. I get it. We don't have any dragons to return to Drago, but I think we might get away with it if we present him with the Chief of Berk! After all, he is the son of Stoik the Vast!"

The crew began to cheer. Hiccup began to shake with rage.

"You really think what Drago's doing is for the greater good?!" Hiccup yelled, "He just gonna start a war! Is that what you want?!"

Their leader stomped up to Hiccup, his face almost touching the mask of Hiccup's helmet.

"How I see it, the war has already begun."

When Avis had turned away from Hiccup, two of his men grabbed Hiccup by the arms and dragged his towards the cellar. Hiccup fought against them, but went limp in their arms when his side continued to burn with pain.

"Get up!" one of his captors shouted, "We don't got all day!"

The other man continued to pull him back, causing Hiccup to yelp in pain. Avis turned back around to see what the fuss was all about.

"What's going on back there?!" he roared over their heads, "The sun won't stay up forever!"

"He won't get up!"

"Even I can tell he's in pain! I want him in one piece when we deliver him to Drago!"

Mitch, the Viking on Hiccup's left side, looked down to see what the problem was, and noticed something peculiar.

"Avis," Mitch said, "you might wanna take a look at this."

Avis marched over to the men and foe. Standing next to Hiccup, Mitch took Hiccup's left hand and presented it to his leader, who was drawn back from the blackness that covered his hand. Hiccup himself took a peek and saw the scales that at first covered his wrist had spread to the rest of his hand.

Avis grabbed Hiccup by the wrist and looked straight into his right eye, invading his personal space.

"What is this?" he said in a grim voice.

No answer.

"Answer me!"

Hiccup continued to stare past him, looking at the small boy behind him.

Avis forced Hiccup back to his grey eyes. "I'm gonna ask you one more time, and I ain't gonna ask again, what is the reason for your hand?"

Hiccup decided to remain quiet, which only angered the dragon trapper more.

"You will answer me!" Avis spat, looking at Hiccup's unopened eye. "And you will do so with both eyes open!"

Avis struggled against Hiccup to open his eyelid, ending up poking his left eye doing so. Avis took the advantage after Hiccup rubbed his injured eye and removed his hand to reveal an eye of a Night Fury.

"What is happening?!" Avis shouted in shock.

"Sail into the fog. Maybe you'll find out then."

Avis grew more serious and stood back up, leaving Hiccup on his knees.

"Take him below deck." He told his men, looking away from the monstrosity.

When Hiccup had disappeared, Avis made his way to Brant who looked startled when he had approached him.

"Hey, Avis." Brant said.

"Brant!" Avis shouted, startling the teen, "Show me your leg. Now!"

Brant sighed, and pulled up the pant of his right leg to show the multiple green scales that now hid the scar. Avis was wide eyed with concern, which soon changed more to frustration.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"You never asked me about it, so I didn't say anything."

"I did ask you!"

"Which I was going to tell you but then you got distracted."

"So it's my fault?"

"That's not what I said!"

"Were you implying it?"

"No!"

"Then why didn't you tell me?! What's the real answer?!"

"I was afraid!"

Avis stopped walking toward Brant when he was cornered to the other side of the deck.

"I was afraid of what you would think and Drago and being locked up in one of those cages."

"I'm sorry, Brant."

Brant looked at him, fear still in his eyes.

"Escort him below deck. Keep him far away from the prisoner," He told Hoark.

"Please, Avis, no. Oh no!"

"I'll try to reason with Drago when we get back, but I can't promise anything."

"Please, Avis, please! I don't want to be caged! Please!"

Avis turned away from him as he was led down to the cellar. He held himself and continued to bark orders.

"Steer us away! Let's head back!"

"Aye, Cap'n!"

The boat swayed as it rotated in the direction of their island base, leaving the Night Fury waiting at the edge.


	12. Ch12 Finding Answers

**A.N- Hey, everyone! Who's ready for chapter 12! Yay!.. Anyways, I hope you all enjoy this chapter. This was originally going to have other stuff with it, but I kinda added more than I thought I was, so that extra stuff will be in the next chapter. I honestly thought I wouldn't be updating until sometime in February, but I'm happy that I'm doing it sooner. Just a quick note about this, there might be something in this chapter that you might be like, "What? That's not right!" Well, when you get to that part, don't worry, it's suppose to be there. It'll get resolved later in the chapter. Anyways, enjoy Chapter 12, and STAY AWESOME!**

* * *

_Chapter 12_

_**Finding Answers**_

Toothless paced at the edge anxiously after seeing the men take Hiccup onto their ship. His view of Hiccup was obstructed by the Vikings standing around him. _Were they hurting him? Who are they anyway? What was going on on that boat?!_ He soon spotted him after some of the Vikings moved out of the way of his perspective. Hiccup was kneeling down, in pain. Toothless was becoming frantic. _Did they do that, or was it perhaps from his transformation?_

His mind flashed back to the point just before the net took down Hiccup. Toothless sensed his tenseness towards his side. That's why he was too late to avoid it. The pain was becoming more frantic. If only he'd done something, Hiccup may not be in the hands of these strangers, who were giving the Night Fury a bad vibe.

Toothless shook his head, forcing himself back to the present. When he looked back at his friend, the one who had scooped him out of the water was fighting with him, like Hiccup had taken something that was his. Concentrating more, it looked as if he was trying to force him to open his eye.

"_Don't give in, Hiccup! He'll give up eventually!" _

But to his dismay, he saw the brawny Viking back up in terror at Hiccup, who had both eyes open.

Toothess focused his hearing down towards the boat, curious on what was being said.

"What is happening?!" He heard the one Viking shout.

Then he heard Hiccup reply, "Sail into the fog. Maybe you'll find out then."

In a way, Toothless smiled on the inside at Hiccup's cocky response. But he went into a frenzy once the Viking, presumably the other Vikings' leader, had ordered his men to take Hiccup below deck.

_Why would they want him below deck? Were they going to bring him back?_ Toothless was sure it was a definite "No" at his last remark.

He listened no more to what was happening, but only focused on trying to find a way to get over there to save his friend. Even if Hiccup hadn't set his fin to where he could easily glide over, there was still a chance he could make it. Panic spread through him as the boat began to turn back around in the opposite direction. If he was going to attempt this, he had to do it now.

Toothless spread his wings and positioned his true tailfin in the best manner for the appropriate distance. He readied his muscles and body for the jump. Just as he was about to make his glide, something tackled him, pinning his wings to the ground. He tried desperately to get the assailant off him, but whatever was on him wasn't budging. Toothless looked back towards the ocean, and saw that the ship was now too far for him to glide with a floppy, unoperated prosthetic.

He whimpered at possibly the only chance for him to win back Hiccup. He'd never forgive himself if anything were to happen to him, and in Hiccup's situation, there couldn't have been a worse time. Who knows? Hiccup may even transform on that ship and be killed. If he did indeed change into a dragon on the voyage, Toothless only hoped he'd get away.

Once Toothless gave up, the creature that had stood over him seemed to vanish. Toothless jump back up in rage to meet his mugger. Nothing was there. Not even a bird. _Was it a dragon?_ Toothless looked up around the sky, turning in circles in every which way to see where the attacker could've possibly gone. Listening carefully, he heard footsteps approaching. He turned around, ready to attack, only to see it was Dyina emerging from the village.

"It's just me, Toothless!"

Toothless, even having lost his friend, was relieved.

"Dyina, thank goodness." He jogged over to where she stood.

"What is it, Toothless? Where's Hiccup?"

Toothless swallowed, holding back tears.

"Somebody took him. One second we were flying, having a blast. Then suddenly, nets came flying at us, one got Hiccup, causing him to lose balance and fall. I tried to get him, but ended up landing on the edge of Berk while Hiccup plummeted into the water. The leader on the boat scooped Hiccup out and took him. I don't know what they want with him. But Hiccup…"

"What about Hiccup?" She asked, trying to sound as calm as possible.

"Oh, nothing. I'm just worried about him."

Dyina wrapped her arms around Toothless' thick neck, trying to comfort him in his loss.

"Don't worry, Toothless, we'll get him back."

"I hope so."

From around the building they were behind, a blond, female Viking on a blue Deadly Nadder emerged from on the dragon's back. It was Astrid.

"Oh my gods! What happened?" She jumped off Stormfly and ran over to Toothless.

"I was just prepping Stormfly for our morning flight, hoping to join you guys, when I suddenly saw both of you fall!"

Astrid looked over at Dyina, who looked like she had something to say.

"Hiccup told me you could talk to dragons. Please, just tell me what you already know."

Dyina was astonished, but relieved at the same time.

"Well, I just got here not too long before you. Toothless told me these Vikings on a ship were shooting nets at them and got Hiccup. He fell into the water while Toothless made it on land. Whoever it was took Hiccup."

Astrid looked both worried sick and also like she wanted to throw in axe in someone's head.

"How long ago did they leave?" she said to Toothless.

After he grumbled and growled out his answer, Dyina translated for him.

"It wasn't too long ago. He said he was gonna try and glide to the boat the best he could with his prosthetic still where Hiccup had to control it, but something held him back, like a dragon of some sort."

"What did the dragon look… wait, hold on."

Astrid looked into the distance. If the boat left not too long ago, they may still be able to spot it. Squinting her eyes, she did indeed see a boat in the distance.

Astrid ran over to her dragon, climbing up to her saddle.

"Stormfly, go!"

The two launched in the air, making their way towards the boat.

Toothless suddenly felt weight on his back. He looked up to see Dyina, placing her foot on the pedal for the tailfin.

"I think I know how to maneuver the fin, at least where we can get far enough to that boat. Come on!"

Like a bullet, Toothless and Dyina were in the sky.

Astrid had made it to the boat first, but only a second before Toothless and Dyina had landed. There they found a bulk Viking with a bushy beard along with a younger one at his side, both with brownish-red curls. The two froze when they landed, exchanging a small parcel when they had done so.

Astrid jumped off the Nadder, a small dagger in her presence. The two Vikings looked frightened, dropping the package and backing away. She paid no heed to Toothless' grumbling.

"Um, Astrid," Dyina said, somewhat quietly.

"Alright, one of you is going to tell what you've done to Hiccup and where he is!"

"Astrid!"

Astrid at this point had the knife up to the older one's neck, who was shaking to death.

"ASTRID!"

Astrid turned her gaze, the blade still up to the Viking throat.

"What?! Can't you see I'm a little busy?!"

"Toothless told me, which I was trying to tell you, that this. isn't. the right. boat."

Astid looked back at the man guiltily, who now looked at her with a scowl.

"Hehe…Sorry!" Astird apologized, bringing the blade away from his neck.

"How about you tell me why you've come to my boat, putting knives at my throat!"

Astrid backed away in surprise. "I'm terribly sorry! We thought this was someone else's boat."

"And why are you looking for your chief on my ship, anyway?"

"Because, wait, how did you know Hiccup's our chief?"

"Because I happen to be the merchant who delivers mostly your precious metals to Berk! Not to mention certain herbs that aren't grown on your island! You can even ask Gobber. He and I are old friends."

"Oh! I thought he looked familiar." Toothless warbled.

"I wouldn't have known. I've never seen him before." Dyina whispered to Toothless.

Dyina grabbed the merchant's attention. "Who are you?"

Dyina was caught by surprise. "Oh, I'm Dyina. Dyina Hopinskin, sir."

"What do ya think you're doin' with the chief's Night Fury?"

"That's why we came invading your boat." Astrid answered, "You see, these strangers came and took him. We thought this was there boat at first."

The merchant's eyes were wide. Hiccup was so nice. Why would someone want to take him?

"I saw a boat."

Everyone's attention went to the little boy, who had picked up the package he dropped.

"When?" asked Dyina.

"Not too long ago. I heard this tall one shouting at his men. They went that way, I think."

Astrid and Dyina looked in the direction the boy pointed in, which was a second path, which they'd followed when looking for Eret when Hiccup disappeared on their last big quest.

"Oh no."

"What is it? Is something wrong?"

"I think I know who took him." Astrid replied. She turned her head towards Dyina, who was still on top of Toothless. "Dragon Trappers."

"Dragon Trappers?"

"Eret used to be one. You've met him, right?"

"I've ran into him a couple times, but I still don't understand."

"I'll explain later. Let's seen if we can spot that boat."

Astrid climbed back up on Stormfly, immediately taking off in the boy's direction. Dyina was ready to follow, before she was stopped by the little boy.

"Before you go, could I, just, pet him?"

Dyina couldn't say no to those puppy dog eyes. She nodded in reply and he joyfully ran his palm across Toothless' head, who purred in the process.

"Thank you! I've never really seen a dragon before, as well as touch one. This is the first year I was allowed to sail with Pa, and we don't get many dragons where we live."

"Hmm, are you by chance from Nautdiell?"

"Yeah! How did you know?"

Dyina shrugged. "Lucky guess." The truth was that Nautdiell had been an island that she had visited, hoping hat she could make it her home. Sadly, their chief turned her down, afraid she'd somehow disrupt their peace. What she does remember from her short visit were the eels that flourished the surrounding sea. Maybe it was best she didn't stay there. The scent of eel repulsed her.

Dyina had caught up with Astrid. It was a good thing Night Furies were a fast species. It felt as if they've looked forever for the trappers' boat, and were losing faith that they'd find it in the middle of the ocean. Astrid thought about why they weren't around to be found, but then face palmed herself and grumbled about how stupid she was.

"What is it, Astrid?" Dyina asked.

"We've been going in the direction towards where the dragon trappers were _before_ we fought them! They've probably moved their base somewhere else, knowing we knew where they were! Oh, stupid, stupid, stupid!" Astrid continued to smack herself in the face.

"It's okay, Astrid. It was an easy mistake anyone could've made."

"No, it's NOT okay! They've got Hiccup and are now ahead of us because of my mistake!"

Astrid leaned her head into Stormfly and started to sob. Stormfly cooed to comfort her rider, which Dyina could understand as, "It's okay. We'll get him and those nasty dragon trappers, you'll see."

Dyina didn't know what to say. She sort of knew the pain of being separated from those you love, but knew no words that truly eased the pain.

"We'll find him, Astrid," Dyina proceeded to say, "Hiccup's smart and bold. He won't go down without a fight."

Astrid raised her head and wiped her tears.

"You're right. *sniffle* Hiccup knows how to handle himself. It's just more nerve-racking because, well, part of that story I need to tell you involves a man named Drago, who a) killed Hiccup's father, and b) was defeated mostly by Hiccup and Toothless. That and…and.."

"And what?"

Astrid hesitated, "Well, everyone was gonna find out anyway, and might as well tell you and the others about Hiccup's condition."

Dyina waited for her response. Was he sick? Dying, even?

"..Hiccup's turning into a dragon."

Okay, she wasn't expecting that.

"Uh..what?"

"A Night Fury to be exact. Y'see, just before you arrived, Hiccup went exploring this one island, which now that I think of it, he didn't even name.."

"Astrid."

"Sorry! Off topic. Anyways, There was a bunch of fog, and suddenly, this dragon appeared out of nowhere, which Hiccup told me formed out of the fog, and bit him, which we believe is the reason why he's transforming into a..uh, Hello? Anyone in there?"

Dyina stopped listening when she heard "fog" and "dragon" in the same sentence. That was all she needed. Noticing Astrid was trying to get her attention, she snapped out of her gaze.

"Sorry! Yeah, now that you mention it, I did see some scales on his wrist, along with his nails being black. He also hid his eye when I asked about it, which, thinking harder about it, did look reptilian. Do you know how long he has until…"

"By the looks and sounds of it, not very long. Definitely less than a week."

"Well, you go back and round up a search party. I, on the other hand, have somewhere else to be."

"Wha..Where are you going?" Astrid asked, seeing Dyina start in a different direction than Berk.

"There's something I need to check out," Dyina replied, "It involves Hiccup."

Astrid thought she seemed suspicious. Maybe Hiccup should have been more cautious before letting her stay. Maybe _she_ should be more cautious about her.

"Um, ok. Just be careful. And watch out for Toothless, or you'll have to deal with me." Astrid gave her a look that said _"I mean it!"_

"Don't worry, I will. I promise I'll bring Toothless back in one piece."

Astrid and Stormfly headed back towards Berk, while Dyina and Toothless went in the opposite direction.

"Where are we going?" Toothless asked his current rider.

"A place I believe we'll find the one that can stop Hiccup's transformation, or at least turn him back if it happens before we get him back."

"That's reassuring." The Night Fury mumbled.

It felt like hours, and they've flown over various islands, some inhabited by friendly Vikings that waved them on, others with not-so-friendly Vikings that tried to shoot them down, or just those that looked like nothing lived on them at all, except maybe some wild dragons, who, fortunately, didn't notice them. The island they were over now was almost void, with the exceptions of the plant life that flourished. Under them was a blend of auburn and sun, with some green in the mix. In meadows that lacked the fall trees were rainbows of flowers of reds, oranges, yellows, purples and whites, which were swarmed by butterflies of different species, with the occasional hummingbird and bee. But on the other half of the island was just the opposite. Past the warmth was cold and inhospitable. Shards of rocks littered the ground. The trees were dead or dying. No flowers bloomed. No buzzing was heard from any insect except of those from mosquitos. Only the rush of water was heard.

"Are you sure you know where you're going?" Toothless whispered, in case any dragons lived here, which he doubted any welcoming ones would live in such a hostile place.

"Just keep flying."

About a minute or so passed, and they came onto a thick fog. Toothless' nerves were set on edge.

"Shouldn't we go back now?"

"No. We need to find a safe place to land."

"Safe?!" Uh, if you hadn't noticed, I wouldn't really call this half of the island safe! Besides, didn't you hear Astrid? Not to mention, I was actually there when Hiccup was attacked!"

"Shh! There." Dyina pointed to a particular spot that was the covered in the thinnest part of the fog, compared to everywhere else.

Toothless really didn't want to go anywhere with fog ever again, but obeyed and landed on the dead grass hidden underneath.

"What do you expect to find here?" Toothless asked, "A death wish? Or no, I know, you'd want to be like Hiccup and get turned into a dragon!"

"Keep it down, Toothless!" Dyina replied in a harsh whisper. "Besides, even if that dragon bites me, it's not like it'll affect me."

"How so?"

"Uh…doesn't matter. Let's walk around."

Dyina trudged through the dead forest as if there were no dangers lurking, while Toothless' nerves stood on edge, ready to pounce at the crack of a twig. Dyina was unfamiliar with her surroundings, but continued to march forwards in hopes they'd run into the one thing she came here for.

"Are you sure you know where you going?" Toothless asked.

"I'm not aiming for a specific place," she said, "I'm just looking for something."

"And what exactly are you looking for?"

"Let's just say, you can only find it where there's a thick fog."

Toothless sped up and stopped in front of her, blocking her path with his wings spread. Dyina attempted to go around him, but was only pushed back by his tail.

"Toothless! Let me through!" she shouted, try to get past the dragon..

"Oh no you don't!" he growled, pushing her away with his tail, "You're looking for that dragon, aren't you?"

She didn't reply. She only tried to push harder against one of his wings, only to be flung in the opposite direction.

Dyina grunted, "So maybe I am! I'm just trying to help Hiccup!"

"By what? Getting yourself turned into a dragon?"

"I told you it won't affect me!"

"And you didn't even say how when I asked!"

After another failed attempt to sneak past the Night Fury, Toothless picked her up and got himself ready to take off. However, neither knew how loud their argument was, which had traveled to a certain creature's ears.

"Toothless! Put me down!"

"Not until we are safe in Berk!"

Once Toothless had spread his wings, the surrounding mist wrapped around him. At that moment, something grabbed him by the torso and threw him to the ground. Dyina, who was still in the dragon's grasp, was thrown onto the earth, but quickly stood back up. It took Toothless a moment before he rose to his feet.

Toothless growled immensely. He made circles around Dyina, ready for his assailant to appear. Dyina squinted at something in the mist. In the fog could be seen four eyes, each lacking pupils. Toothless had also seen them, and roared at the beast. The dragon emerged as a Hideous Zippleback. Toothless lunged at the form. The current Zippleback vanished, but reappeared on the opposite side of Dyina.

"Well, well, well," the two heads spoke in unison, "What do we have here?" the dragon brought its eyes closer to Dyina, who was a statue. "Let's see, we have an unordinary Viking girl…" the Zippleback came closer to the raging Night Fury, drawing its gaze away from Dyina. "And a lame Night Fury, who for some reason seems to be missing his real owner."

Toothless, once again, tried to attack the misty form, only to maul nothing but the air and inanimate fog. The dragon reappeared behind Toothless, but soon transported himself back next to Dyina when the Night Fury tried clawed at the figure.

"How dare you mention Hiccup! After what you've done to him!" Toothless screeched while he continuously stuck at the mist. But when he saw the dragon had put himself next to the girl, he bared his teeth. "Get away from her!"

"Now, now. Calm yourself. Would you feel better if I was a Terrible Terror?" the Hideous Zippleback transformed itself onto the puny dragon of a Terror.

"I'd feel better if you were dead!" Toothless roared, charging at the dragon for the millionth time.

When the dragon reappeared, this time, Dyina stopped the Night Fury from attacking.

"Toothless, just wait."

"But he's responsible for Hiccup! He wouldn't even be on that trapper's ship if it were for the guy biting him!"

"Just let me talk to him."

"Technically, I'm genderless," the dragon spoke from afar.

"I know that," Dyina said, "just used to referring to living things by gender."

"So, what brings you, Dyina?"

"Hold on!" Toothless shouted, "You know each other."

"We've only met once," the Terror said, "but my species is excellent at remembering things."

"And what species is that?" Toothless asked.

"Drauger Faenks, which some would say are "Soulless".

"I see you never got rid of that nickname for me."

"Why should I?"

"Oh, how it pierces through my heart."

"You don't have one."

"Every living thing has a heart. How would I be alive without one?"

"There are many magical properties in this world."

"Of course you'd be the one to know that, wouldn't you, Dyina?"

The small Terrible Terror reformed into a species of dragon Toothless didn't recognize, but one that Dyina was more than familiar with. But before Toothless could make out the details, it changed back into a Terrible Terror.

"I just need one thing from you," Dyina uttered.

"Oh? What is that?" the misty creature asked.

"Change Hiccup back."

"Ah, I saw that coming," the Terror stretched, "Now, why would I want to do that?"

"Why not?" Toothless grumbled.

"There can be many reasons," it said, shifting into the form of a Night Fury, "for starters, I'm only trying to save a dying species."

"Now you and I both know that isn't entirely true," Dyina said. Toothless gave her a confused look.

"Well, I did turn him into, I would say, one of the most exquisite of all dragons. Not to mention the dragon itself is a most powerful creature."

"As well as human."

The dragon gave her a questionable look. "And how is that?"

"Vikings can build things with their very hands, as well as craft and draw. The can create weapons that can kill and overpower a dragon." The misty Night Fury yawned. Dyina continued, "Not to mention Hiccup has a family and friends that treasure him, as well as an entire village that look to him for support."

"And you think I care?"

Dyina's patience was dwindling. "I was hoping that you might think about other's lives before turning them into dragons."

The dragon laughed. Dyina's temper arose. "You sadist!" This time, Dyina was the one to attack, which of course had the same result as Toothless' assaults.

"Come out and fight, Soulless!" She shouted, a strange look in her eyes.

"If a brawl is what you want, Dyina," a voice came from behind, "come and get me."

Dyina spun around, the Night Fury in fighting position. Before anything could happen, however, sharp spines came out of nowhere, threatening to strike the Drauger Faenk. The dragon screeched when one landed in one of its pupil-less eyes. The misty figure coward away back into the fog, leaving drops of water in its spot. The unusual gaze left Dyina's eyes.

"What in Thor's name do you think you were doing?!" Astrid yelled.

"Astrid?" Dyina and Toothless asked in unison. "What are you doing here?"

* * *

Earlier that day…

"Wha..Where are you going?" Astrid asked, seeing Dyina start in a different direction than Berk.

"There's something I need to check out," Dyina replied, "It involves Hiccup."

"Um, ok. Just be careful. And watch out for Toothless, or you'll have to deal with me."

"Don't worry, I will. I promise I'll bring Toothless back in one piece."

Astrid and Stormfly headed back towards Berk, while Dyina and Toothless went in the opposite direction.

You'd have to call Astrid mad if she were to let anyone except Hiccup take off with Toothless alone. Especially someone she had only just met.

She watched as Dyina and Toothless ventured farther and farther away, almost out of distance to be seen.

"Come on, Stormfly." She whispered to her dragon.

Stormfly turned and followed after them, making sure to stay out of sight. They almost lost them when an island of hostile Vikings threw nets and bolas at the passing flyers, which, at the same time, they were almost given away.

Astrid had no idea where she was going, but continued to follow the girl and the Night Fury ahead. She only hoped they wouldn't hear them approaching. Deadly Nadders weren't the quietest flyers, and would be easier to hear over silent islands. The one they glided over was especially quite, except for the sound of bees and birds. It was a beautiful island, but Astrid could only take a glance to reassure she wouldn't lose them now. A chill crawled against her bare skin when the beauty was replaced with a cold and desolate territory. She only hoped that they'd pass soon, especially with the thick fog that flourished through the dead wood.

Suddenly, the Night Fury and his rider disappeared into the mist below. Astrid was caught off guard and flew over their landing spot.

"Oh, great." Astrid grumbled under her breath."

* * *

"Wait," Dyina said, "You were following us?"

"It took some time until we could actually find you. Luckily, your yelling gave you away."

Dyina's cheeks became a light pink.

"Well, Let's get back to Berk. You can explain what idea went through your head on the way back."

"I was just trying to find a cure."

Astrid sighed. "I appreciate it. I'm sure Hiccup would as well, but what you did was dangerous. You could've gotten yourself killed."

"I know what I was doing."

"When I got here, it looked like you were going to go hand-in-hand against a fire breathing dragon!"

"Actually, that dragon can't breath fire."

"Not my point, Dyina! My point is, however, that trying to fight a dragon with your bare hands doesn't seem like you knew what you were doing!"

"I…" Dyina took a deep breath, "I'm sorry. I was trying to reason with it and it got to the point where I lost my temper."

"Lost your temper, indeed," said Toothless, "It looked as if you were gonna burst into flames! Yeah, you got this weird look in your eye, and…" he stopped after he realized Dyina was staring at him. "What? Sure, it was dangerous, but at the same time it was a little entertaining."

"And you were gonna carry me back to Berk!" Dyina exclaimed, "And, by the way, how exactly were you gonna do that _without_ a rider?"

Toothless blinked, and face palmed at his stupidity. "I-I'm used to Hiccup being my rider."

"Mhmm."

Dyina climbed onto the leather saddle and put her foot into the mechanism.

"Alright, let's just get back to Berk and gather a search party."

"Sounds like a plan," Astrid replied.

Stormfly and Astrid had already lifted off, hovering as they waited for Dyina and Toothless to join. Dyina adjusted Toothless' tailfin into the position he needed to lift off, but felt the mist's chill across the back of her neck. There was a whisper:

"Even if I wanted to, I, alone, do not hold the cure."

Toothless had started his takeoff, but was soon plummeting to the ground after Dyina had run off behind him.

"Dyina!" Astrid yelled, "Where are you going!"

Dyina didn't listen. She ran into the fog a little deeper, but stopped after finding no sign of the dragon's appearance.

"What do you mean you don't hold it alone?!" she shouted into the oblivion. "Answer me!"

Still no answer.

"What did you mean?!"

"Dyina!"

She turned to see Astrid, still mounted on her Nadder.

"What in Odin's name are you doing?!"

Dyina stumbled over her words, "I-I.. It…I was just…"

"Just get on Toothless and head back to Berk!" Astrid said, pointing to Toothless. "And to make sure you get off this island, you're going ahead of me."

Dyina obeyed and trudged back to where Toothless had fallen.

"Sorry 'bout that," she told him, wiping the dirt from his muzzle.

She proceeded to climb onto the Night Fury's back, following the same routine she had done before bolting into the forest. When they were in the sky, Astrid and Stormfly followed. As they passed over the island, Dyina couldn't help but to look back. Not at the autumn forest or the wildflowers in the meadow, but towards the fog that began to disappear from around the black trees and poisoned land beyond.


End file.
